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> Uii-Tisn PRIVATK? V rop THE A. 
By THJS DS VIKNE PRESS, 
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A JOURNEY IN 
SOUTHEASTERN MEXICO 



NARRATIVE OF EXPERIENCES, AND OBSER- 
VATIONS ON AGRICULTURAL 
AND INDUSTRIAL 
CONDITIONS 



BY 

HENRY H. HARPER 



PRINTED PRIVATELY FOR THE AUTHOR 
BY THE DE VINNE PRESS. N. Y. 
BOSTON -MCMX 






Copyright, 1910, 
By Henry H. Harper 

All rights reserved 



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A LIMITED NUMBER OP COPIES OP THIS WORK HAVE 

BEEN ISSUED PRIVATELY FOR DISTRIBUTION 

AMONG THE AUTHOR'S PRIENDS AND 

BOOK-LOVING ACQUAINTANCES,— 

MOSTLY TO MEMBERS OF 

THE BIBLIOPHILE SOCIETY 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE 

THE volume here presented to the reader 
does not profess to be a history or descrip- 
tion of Mexico as a whole, nor does it claim to be 
typical of all sections of the country. It deals 
simply with an out-of-the-way and little-known 
region, accompanied by a history of personal ex- 
periences, with comment upon conditions almost 
or quite unknown to the ordinary traveler. 

Many books upon Mexico have been written— 
a few by competent and others by incompetent 
hands— in which the writers sometimes charge 
each other with misstatements and inaccuracies, 
doubtless oftentimes with reason. However that 
may be, I have yet to discover among them a nar- 
rative, pure and simple, of travel, experiences and 
observations in the more obscure parts of that 
country, divested of long and tedious topograph- 
ical descriptions. Narrations which might be of 
interest, once begun, are soon lost in discussion 
of religious, political, and economic problems, 
or in singing the praises of "the redoubtable 
Cortez," or the indefatigable somebody else who 
is remembered chiefly for the number of people 



he caused to be killed ; or in describing the 
beauty of some great valley or hill which the 
reader perhaps never saw and never will see. 

I have always felt that a book should never be 
printed unless it is designed to serve some wor- 
thy purpose, and that as soon as the author has 
written enough to convey his message clearly he 
should stop. There are many books in which 
the essential points could be encompassed within 
half the number of pages allotted to their con- 
tents. A good twenty-minute sermon is better 
than a fairly good two-hour sermon ; hence I be- 
lieve in short sermons,— and short books. 

With this conviction, before placing this manu- 
script in the hands of the printer I sought to 
ascertain what possible good might be accom- 
plished by its issue in printed form. My first 
thought was to consult some authority, upon the 
frankness and trustworthiness of whose opinion 
I could rely with certainty. I therefore placed 
the manuscript in the hands of my friend Mr. 
Charles E. Hurd, whose excellent scholarship 
and sound literary judgment, coupled with a life- 
long experience as an editor and critical re- 
viewer, qualify him as an authority second to 
none in this country. He has done me the 
honor voluntarily to prepare a few introductory 
lines which are printed herein. 

In view of the probability that very few, if any, 
among the restricted circle who read this book 
will ever traverse the territory described, I am 
vi 



forced to conclude that for the present it can 
serve no better purpose than that of affording 
such entertainment as may be derived from the 
mere reading of the narrative. If, however, it 
should by chance fall into the hands of any indi- 
vidual who contemplates traveling, or investing 
money, in this district, it might prove to be of a 
value equal to the entire cost of the issue. 
Moreover, it may serve a useful purpose in en- 
lightening and entertaining those who are con- 
tent to leave to others the pleasures of travel as 
well as the profits derived from investments in 
the rural agricultural districts of Mexico. 

Possibly a hundred years hence the experi- 
ences, observations, and modes of travel herein 
noted will be so far outgrown as to make them 
seem curious to the traveler who may cover the 
same territory, but I predict that even a thou- 
sand years from now the conditions there will 
not undergo so radical a change that the traveler 
may not encounter the same identical customs 
and the same aggravating pests and discom- 
forts that are so prevalent today. Doubtless 
others have traversed this territory with similar 
motives, and have made practically the same 
mental observations, but I do not find that any- 
one has taken the pains to record them either as 
a note of warning to others, or as a means of 
replenishing a depleted exchequer. 

In issuing this book I feel somewhat as I 
imagine Horace did when he wrote his ode to 
vii 



Pyrrha,— which was perhaps not intended for 
the eye of Pyrrha at all, but was designed merely 
as a warning to others against her false charms, 
or against the wiles of any of her sex. He de- 
clared he had paid the price of his folly and in- 
experience, and had hung up his dripping clothes 
in the temple as a danger-signal for others— 

Ah ! wretched those who love, yet ne'er did try 
The smiUng treachery of thine eye ; 
But I 'm secure, my danger 's o'er. 
My table shows the clothes ^ I vow'd 
When midst the storm, to please the god, 

I have hung up, and now am safe on shore. 

So am I. Horace, being a confirmed bachelor, 
probably took his theme from some early love 
affair which would serve as a key-note that 
would strike at the heart and experience of 
almost every reader. The apparent ease with 
which one can make money and enjoy trips in 
Mexico is scarcely less deceptive than were the 
bewitching smiles of Horace's Pyrrha. Indeed 
the fortune-seeker there can see chimerical 
Pyrrhas everywhere. 

Although it has been said that truth is stranger 
than fiction, it is observable that most of the 
great writers have won their fame in fiction, 

1 It was customary for the shipwrecked sailor to deposit 
in the temple of the divinity to whom he attributed his 
escape, a votive picture (tabula) of the occurrence, to- 
gether with his clothes, the only things which had been 
saved. 

viii 



possibly because they could not find truths 
enough to fill a volume. In setting down the 
narrative of a journey through Mexico, however, 
there is no occasion to distort facts in order to 
make them appear strange, and often incredible, 
to the reader. We are so surfeited with books 
of fiction that I sometimes feel it is a wholesome 
diversion to pick up a book containing a few facts, 
even though they be stated in plain homespun 
language. It is fair to assume that in writing 
a book the author's chief purpose is to convey a 
message of some sort in language that is under- 
standable. In the following pages I have there- 
fore not attempted any flourishes with the 
English language, but have simply recorded the 
facts and impressions in a discursive conversa- 
tional style, just as I should relate theih verbally, 
or write them in correspondence to some friend. 

H. H. H. 
Boston/ Mass., 
October, 1909. 



IX 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE 
BY CHARLES E. HURD 

THE present volume in which Mr. Harper tells 
the story of his personal experiences and 
observations in a section of Mexico which is 
now being cleverly exploited in the advertising 
columns of the newspapers as the great agricul- 
tural and fruit-growing region of the North 
American continent, has a peculiar value, and 
one that gives it a place apart from the ordinary 
records of travel. The journey described was 
no pleasure trip. The three who took part in it 
were young, ambitious, and full of energy. Each 
had a fair amount of capital to invest, and each, 
inspired by the accounts of visitors and the ad- 
vertisements of land speculators setting forth 
the wonderful opportunities for easy money 
making in agricultural ventures along the east- 
ern coast of Mexico, believed that here was a 
chance to double it. There was no sentiment in 
the matter; it was from first to last purely a 
business venture. The scenery might be en- 
chanting, the climate perfect, and the people 
possessed of all the social requirements, but 
xi 



while these conditions would be gratefully ac- 
cepted, they were regarded by the party as 
entirely secondary— they were after money. 
The recorded impressions are therefore the re- 
sult of deliberate and thoughtful investigation,— 
not of the superficial sort such as one would 
acquire on a pleasure-seeking trip. They differ • 
essentially from the unpractical views of the 
writer who is sent into Mexico to prepare a 
glowing account of the country's resources from 
a casual and personally disinterested view of 
conditions. 

The story of the trip by land and water from 
Tampico to Tuxpam is photographic in its real- 
ism. In no book on Mexico has the character 
of the peon been as accurately drawn as in this 
volume. Most writers have been content to 
sketch in the head and bust of the native Mexi- 
can, but here we have him painted by the deft 
hand of the author at full length, with all his 
trickery, his laziness and his drunkenness upon 
him. One cannot help wondering why he was 
ever created or what he was put here for. In 
this matter of character-drawing Mr. Harper's 
book is unique. 

The results of the investigations in this sec- 
tion of the country to which the party had been 
lured are graphically set forth by Mr. Harper in 
a half-serious, half-humorous manner which 
gives the narrative a peculiar interest. He 
perhaps feels that he has been "stung," but yet 
xii 



he feels that he can stand it, and enters no com- 
plaint. Besides, the experience is worth some- 
thing. 

Of course the volume does not cover all 
Mexico, but its descriptions are fairly typical of 
the larger portion of the country, particularly 
as regards the people, their habits, morals and 
methods of living. Aside from its interest as a 
narrative the book has an important mission. 
It should be in the hands of every prospective 
investor in Mexican property, especially those 
whose ears are open to the fascinating promises 
and seductive tales of the companies formed for 
agricultural development. A single reading will 
make nine out of ten such restrap their pocket- 
books. The reader will be well repaid for the 
time spent in a perusal of the volume, and it is 
to be regretted that the author has determined 
to print it only for private and restricted dis- 
tribution. 

Boston, October 25, 1909. 



xm 



A JOURNEY IN 
SOUTHEASTERN MEXICO 



THERE are few civilized countries where the 
American pleasure-seeking traveler is so 
seldom seen as in the rural districts of 
southeastern Mexico, along the coast between 
Tampico and Vera Cruz. The explanation for 
this is doubtless to be found in the fact that 
there is perhaps no other civilized country where 
the stranger is subjected to so many personal 
discomforts and vexations resulting from incom- 
modious facilities for travel, and from the mul- 
tiplicity of pests that beset his path. 

The writers of books on Mexican travel usually 
keep pretty close to the beaten paths of travel, 
and discreetly avoid the by-ways in those por- 
tions far removed from any railroad or highway. 
They acquire their observations and impressions 
chiefly from the window of the comfortable pas- 
senger-coach or from the veranda of some hotel 
where three good meals are served daily, or 
from government reports and hearsay,— which 
are often unreliable. It is only the more daring 
fortune-hunters that brave the dangers and 
discomforts of the remote regions, and from 

3 



these we are rarely favored with a line, either 
because they have no aptitude for writing, or, as 
is more likely, because, wishing to forget their 
experiences as speedily as possible, they make no 
permanent record of them. Tourists visiting Mex- 
ico City, Monterey, Tampico and other large cities 
are about as well qualified to discourse upon the 
conditions prevailing in the agricultural sections 
of the unfrequented country districts as a for- 
eigner visiting Wall Street would be to write 
about the conditions in the backwoods of nor- 
thern Maine. I can readily understand the ten- 
dency of writers to praise the beauty of Mexican 
scenery and to expatiate upon the wonderful pos- 
sibilities in all agricultural pursuits. In passing 
rapidly from one section to another without see- 
ing the multifarious diflficulties encountered from 
seedtime to harvest, they get highly exaggerated 
ideas from first impressions, which in Mexico are 
nearly always misleading. The first time I be- 
held this country, clothed in the beauty of its 
tropical verdure, I wondered that everybody 
did n't go there to live, and now I marvel that 
anybody should live there, except possibly for 
a few months in winter. If one would obtain 
reliable intelligence about Mexico and its ad- 
vantages — or rather its disadvantages — for 
profitable agriculture, let him get the honest 
opinion of some one who has tried the experi- 
ment on the spot, of investing either his money 
or his time, or both, with a view to profit. 

4 



In March, 1896, in company with two friends 
and an interpreter, I went to Mexico, having been 
lured there by numerous exaggerated reports of 
the possibilities in the vanilla, coffee and rubber 
industries. None of us had any intention of re- 
maining there for more than a few months, — long 
enough to secure plantations, put them in charge 
of competent superintendents, and outline the 
work to be pursued. We shared the popular 
fallacy that if the natives, with their crude and 
antiquated methods could produce even a small 
quantity of vanilla, coffee or rubber, we could, 
by employing more progressive and up-to-date 
methods, cause these staple products to be 
yielded in abundant quantities and at so slight a 
cost as to make them highly profitable. We had 
heard that the reason why American investors 
had failed to make money there was because they 
had invested their funds injudiciously, through 
intermediaries, and had no personal knowledge 
of the actual state of affairs at the seat of in- 
vestment. We were therefore determined to in- 
vestigate matters thoroughly by braving the 
dangers and discomforts of pestilence and insects 
and looking the ground over in person. We had 
no idea of forming any company or copartner- 
ship, but each was to make his own observations 
and draw his own conclusions quite independent 
of the others. We agreed, however, to remain 
together and to assist one another as much as 
possible by comparing notes and impressions. 

5 



There was a tacit understanding that all ordi- 
nary expenses of travel should be shared equally 
from one common fund, to which each should 
contribute his share, but that each one should 
individually control his own investment, if such 
were made. Each member of the party had en- 
deavored to post himself as best he could regard- 
ing the necessities of the trip. We consulted 
such accounts of travel in Mexico as were avail- 
able (nothing, however, was found relating to the 
locality that we were to visit), conversed with a 
couple of travelers who had visited the western 
and central parts, and corresponded with various 
persons in that country ; but when we came to- 
gether to compare notes of our requirements for 
the journey no two seemed to agree in any partic- 
ular. Our objective point was Tuxpam, which 
is on the eastern coast almost midway between 
Tampico and Vera Cruz, and a hundred miles 
from any railroad center. As it was our inten- 
tion to barter direct with the natives instead of 
through any land syndicate, we thought best to 
provide ourselves with an ample supply of the 
native currency. Out of the thousand and one 
calculations and estimates that we all made, this 
latter was about the only one that proved to be 
anywhere near correct. In changing our money 
into Mexican currency we were of course eager 
to secure the highest premium, and upon learn- 
ing that American gold was much in demand at 
Tampico (the point where we were to leave the 

6 



railroad) we shipped a quantity of gold coin by 
express to that place. 

Our journey to Tampico was by rail via Laredo 
and Monterey, and was without special incident ; 
the reader need not therefore be detained by a 
recital of what we thought or saw along this 
much traveled highway. This route — especially 
as far as Monterey — is traversed by many 
Americans, and American industry is seen all 
along the line, notably at Monterey. 

Upon arriving at Tampico we were told by the 
money-changers there that they had no use for 
American gold coin. They said that the only way 
in which they could use our money was in the 
form of exchange on some eastern city, which 
could be used by their merchants in making re- 
mittances for merchandise; so we were obliged 
to ship it all back to an eastern bank, and sold 
our checks against a portion of it at a premium 
of eighty cents on the dollar. 

We stalked around town with our pockets 
bulging out with Mexican national bank notes, 
and felt quite opulent. Our wealth had suddenly 
increased to almost double, and it did n't seem 
as if we ever could spend it, dealing it out after 
the manner of the natives, three, six, nine and 
twelve cents at a time. We acquired the habit 
of figuring every time we spent a dollar that we 
really had expended only fifty cents. Our fears 
that we should have difficulty in spending very 
much money must have shone out through our 

7 



countenances, for the natives seemed to read 
them like an open book ; and for every article 
and service they charged us double price and 
over. We soon found we were spending real 
dollars, and before returning home we learned 
to figure the premium the other way. 

The moment we began to transact business 
with these people we became aware that we were 
in the land of manana (tomorrow). The natives 
make it a practice never to do anything today 
that can be put off until tomorrow. Nothing 
can be done today, — it is always "manana," 
which, theoretically, means tomorrow, but in 
common practice its meaning is vague, — possibly 
a day, a week, or a month. Time is reckoned as 
of no consequence whatever, and celerity is a 
virtue wholly unknown. 

Our business and sightseeing concluded, we 
made inquiry as to the way to get to Tuxpam,^ 
a small coast town in the State of Vera Cruz, 
about a hundred miles further south. We in- 
quired of a number of persons and learned of 
nearly as many undesirable or impossible ways 
of getting there. There were coastwise steamers 
from Tuxpam up to Tampico, but none down the 
coast from Tampico to Tuxpam. After spending 

1 The reader should not confound this with other Tuxpams 
and Tuxpans in Mexico. The name of this place is nearly 
always misspelled, Tuxpan, with the final n; it is so 
spelled even in the national post-office directory ; but it 
is correctly spelled with the final m. 



a whole day in fruitless endeavor to find a means 
of transportation we were returning to the hotel 
late in the afternoon, when a native came run- 
ning up behind us and asked if we were the 
Americans who wanted to go to Tuxpam. He 
said that he had a good sailboat and was to sail for 
Tuxpam manana via the laguna, — a chain of lakes 
extending along near the coast from Tampico to 
Tuxpam, connected by channels ranging in 
length from a hundred yards to several miles, 
which in places are very shallow, or totally dry, 
most of the time. We went back with him to 
his boat, which we found to be a sturdy-looking 
craft about thirty feet long, with perhaps a five- 
foot beam. It was constructed of two large 
cedar logs hewn out and mortised together. The 
boatman said he had good accommodations 
aboard and would guarantee to land us at Tuxpam 
in seven days. He wanted two hundred dollars 
(Mexican money, of course) to take our party of 
four. This was more than the whole outfit was 
worth, with his wages for three weeks thrown 
in. We went aboard, and were looking over the 
boat, rather to gratify our curiosity than with 
any intention of accepting his monstrous offer, 
when one of the party discovered a Mexican ly- 
ing in the bottom of the boat with a shawl loosely 
thrown over him. Our interpreter inquired if 
anyone was sick aboard, and was told by the 
owner that the man was a friend of his who was 
ill with the smallpox, and that he was taking him 

9 



to his family in Tuxpam. We stampeded in great 
confusion and on our way to the hotel procured 
a supply of sulphur, carbolic acid, chlorine, and 
all the disinfectants we could think of. Hurry- 
ing to one of our rooms in the hotel, we harred 
the door and discussed what we should do to 
ward off the terrible disease. Some one sug- 
gested that perhaps the boatman was only jok- 
ing, and that after all the man did n't have 
smallpox. It did n't seem plausible that he would 
ask us to embark for a seven days' voyage in 
company with a victim of an infectious disease. 
But who would venture back to ascertain the 
facts? Of course this task fell upon the inter- 
preter, as he was the only one who could speak 
the language. While he was gone we began pre- 
paring for the worst, and after taking account 
of our stock of disinfectants the question was 
which to use and how to apply it. Each one 
recommended a different formula. One of the 
party found some sort of a tin vessel, and 
putting half a pound of sulphur into it, set it 
afire and put it under the bed. We then took 
alternate sniffs of the several disinfectants, and 
debated as to whether we should return home 
at once, or await developments. Meanwhile the 
room had become filled almost to suffocation 
with the sulphur fumes, the burning sulphur had 
melted the solder off the tin vessel, and running 
out had set the floor on fire. About this time 
there was a vigorous rap at the door and some 
10 



one asked a question in Spanish; but none of us 
could either ask or answer questions in that 
language, so there was no chance for an argu- 
ment and we all kept quiet, except for the scuff- 
ling around in the endeavor to extinguish the 
fire. The water-pitcher being empty, as usual, 
some one seized my new overcoat and threw it 
over the flames. At this juncture our interpre- 
ter returned and informed us that it was no 
joke about the sick man, and that the police 
authorities had just discovered him and ordered 
him to the hospital. He found that the boatman 
had already had smallpox and was not afraid of 
it; he was quite surprised at our sudden alarm. 
As the interpreter came in, the man who had 
knocked reappeared, and said that having smelled 
the sulphur fumes he thought someone was 
committing suicide. When we told him what 
had happened he laughed hysterically, but un- 
fortunately we were unable to share the funny 
side of the joke with him. 

That evening when we went down to supper 
everybody seemed to regard us with an air of 
curious suspicion, and we imagined that we were 
tagged all over with visible smallpox bacteria. 
. We afterwards learned that the natives pay 
little more heed to smallpox than we do to 
measles; and especially in the outlying country 
districts, they appear to feel toward it much as 
we do toward measles and whooping-cough, — 
that the sooner they have it and are over with 
11 



it (or rather, it is over with them), the better.^ 
On6 of the party vowed that he would n't go 
to his room to sleep alone that night, because 
he knew he should have the smallpox before 
morning. After supper we borrowed a small 
earthenware vessel and returning to our " coun- 
cil chamber" we started another smudge with 
a combination of sulphur and other fumigating 
drugs. Someone expressed regret that he had 

1 The mortality from smallpox in Mexico is alarming. 
Three weeks later our party stopped over night about 
twelve miles up from Tuxpam on the Tuxpam River op- 
posite a large hacienda called San Miguel. We noticed 
when we arrived that there was a constant hammer- 
ing just over the river in the settlement. It sounded as 
though a dozen carpenters were at work, and the pound- 
ing kept up all night. In the morning we inquired what 
was the occasion of this singular haste in building opera- 
tions, and were told that the workmen were making 
boxes in which to bury the smallpox victims. It was re- 
ported that fifty-one had died the day before, and that 
the number of victims up to this time was upwards of 
three hundred, or nearly one-third of the population of 
the place. One of the natives told us that a very small 
percentage of the patients recover, which is easily un- 
derstood when it is explained that the first form of treat- 
ment consists of a cold-water bath. This drives the fever 
in and usually kills the patient inside of forty-eight hours. 
There was no resident physician and the physicians in 
Tuxpam were too busy to leave town. They would not 
have come out anyway, as not one patient in fifty could 
afford to pay the price of a visit. A nearby settlement 
called jite, numbering sixty odd souls, was almost com- 
pletely blotted out. There were not enough survivors 
to bury the dead. 

12 



ever left home on such a fool's errand. During 
the night it had been noised about that there 
was a party of " Americanos ricos " (rich Ameri- 
cans) who wanted to go to Tuxpam, and next 
morning there were a number of natives waiting 
to offer us various modes of conveyance, all alike 
expensive and tedious. We finally decided to go 
via the laguna in a small boat, and finding that 
one of the men was to start that afternoon we 
went down with him to see his boat, which proved 
to be of about the same construction and dimen- 
sions as the one we had looked at the previous 
afternoon. He said that he had scarcely any 
cargo and would take us through in a hurry ; 
that he would take three men along and if the 
wind was unfavorable they would use the pad- 
dles in poling the boat. His asking price for 
our passage, including provisions, was $150, 
but when he saw that we would n't pay that 
much he dropped immediately to $75 ; so we en- 
gaged passage with him, on his promising to 
land us in Tuxpam in six days. He said there 
was plenty of water in the channels connecting 
the lakes, except at one place where there would 
be a very short carry, and that he had arranged 
for a man and team to draw the boat over. We 
ordered our baggage sent to the boat and not 
liking his bill of fare we set out to provide our- 
selves with our own provisions for the trip. 

When we arrived at the boat we found our 
baggage stored away, with a variety of merchan- 
13 



dise, including a hundred bags of flour, piled on 
top of it. There was not a foot of vacant space 
in the bottom of the boat, and we were expected 
to ride, eat and sleep for six days and nights on 
top of the cargo. The boatman had cunningly 
stored our effects underneath the merchandise 
hoping that we would not back out when we saw 
the cargo he was to take. However, we had be- 
come thoroughly disgusted with the place and 
conditions (the hotel man having arbitrarily 
charged us $25 for the hole we burned in his 
cheap pine floor), and were glad to get out of town 
by any route and at any cost. We all clambered 
aboard and were off at about three p. m. As we 
sat perched up on top of that load of luggage and 
merchandise when the boat pulled out of the 
harbor we must have looked more like pelicans 
sitting on a huge floating log than like " Ameri- 
canos ricos" in search of rubber, vanilla and 
coffee lands. We did n't find as much rubber in 
the whole Republic of Mexico as there appeared 
to be in the necks of those idlers who had gath- 
ered on the shore to see us off. 

The propelling equipment of our boat con- 
sisted of a small sail, to be used in case of favor- 
able breezes — which we never experienced— and 
two long-handled cedar paddles. The blades of 
these were about ten inches wide and two and a 
half feet long, while the handles were about 
twelve feet long. The natives are very skillful 
in handling these paddles. They usually work 
14 



in pairs,— one on each side of the boat. One 
starts at the bow by pressing the point of the 
paddle against the bottom and walks along the 
edge of the boat to the stern, pushing as he 
walks. By the time he reaches the stern his 
companion continues the motion of the boat by 
the same act, beginning at the bow on the 
opposite side. By the time the first man has 
walked back to the bow the second has reached 
the stern, and so on. The boats are usually run 
in the shallow water along near the shore of the 
large bodies of water in the chain of lakes, so 
that the paddles will reach the bottom. The 
boatman had three men besides himself in 
order to have two shifts, and promised that the 
boat should run both night and day. This plan 
worked beautifully in theory, but how well it 
worked out in practice will be seen later on. 
We glided along swimmingly until we reached the 
first channel a short distance from Tampico, and 
here we were held up for two hours getting over 
a shoal. That seemed a long wait, but before 
we reached our destination we learned to mea- 
sure our delays not by hours but by days. After 
getting over the first obstruction we dragged 
along the channel for an hour or so and then 
came to a full stop. We were told that there 
was another shallow place just ahead and that 
we must wait awhile for the tide to float us over. 
We prepared our supper, which consisted of 
ham, canned baked beans, bread, crackers, and 
15 



such delicacies as we had obtained at the stores 
in Tampico. The supper prepared by the natives 
consisted of strips of dried beef cut into small 
squares and boiled with rice and black beans. 
At first we were inclined to scorn such fare as 
they had intended for us, but before we reached 
Tuxpam there were times when it seemed like 
a Presidential banquet. After supper three of 
the boatmen went ahead, ostensibly to see how 
much water there was in the channel, while the 
fourth remained with the boat. After starting 
a mosquito smudge and discussing the situation 
for a couple of hours, we decided to "turn in" 
for the night. The interpreter asked the re- 
maining Mexican where the bedding was. His 
only response was a sort of bewildered grin. He 
did n't seem to understand what bedding was, 
and said they never carried it. We were ex- 
pected to "roost" on top of the cargo without 
even so much as a spread over us, — which we did. 
It was an eventful night,— one of the many of 
the kind that were to follow. After the fire 
died out we fought mosquitoes— the hugest I 
had ever seen— until about three o'clock in the 
morning, when I fell asleep from sheer exhaus- 
tion. There being no frost in this section to kill 
these venomous insects, they appear to grow 
and multiply from year to year until finally they 
die of old age. A description of their size and 
numbers would test the most elastic human 
credulity. Webster must have had in mind this 
16 



variety when he described the mosquito as hav- 
ing "a proboscis containing, within the sheath- 
like labium, six fine sharp needlelike organs 
with which they puncture the skin of man and 
animals to suck the blood." 

I had been asleep but a short time when the 
party returned from the inspection of the 
"water" ahead, and if the fire-water they had 
aboard had been properly distributed it would 
almost have floated us over any shoal in the 
channel. They brought with them two more 
natives who were to help carry the cargo over 
the shallow place, but all five of them were in the 
same drunken condition. In less than ten min- 
utes they all were sound asleep on the grass be- 
side the channel. We were in hopes that such a 
tempting bait might distract some of the mos- 
quitoes from ourselves, but no such luck. The 
mosquitoes had no terrors for them and they 
slept on as peacefully as the grass on which they 
lay. All hands were up at sunrise and we sup- 
posed of course we were to be taken over the 
shoal ; but in this we were disappointed, for this 
proved to be some saint's day, observed by all 
good Mexicans as a day of rest and feasting.^ We 

I I was told in Mexico that every day in the year is re- 
corded as the birthday of some saint, and that every 
child is named after the saint of the same natal day. 
For instance, a male child bom on June 24 would be 
named Juan, after Saint John, or San Juan. The anniver- 
sary days of perhaps thirty or forty of the more notable 
saints are given up to feasting and dissipation. 

17 



endeavored to get them to take us back to town, 
but no one would be guilty of such sacrilege as 
working on a feast-day. When asked when we 
could proceed on the journey they said "Ma- 
nana," After breakfast our party strolled off 
into the pasture along the channel and when we 
returned to the boat a few minutes later the 
Mexicans shouted in a chorus " Garrapatas ! 
mucho malo ! " at the same time pointing to our 
clothes, which were literally covered with small 
wood-ticks, about half the size of an ordinary 
pinhead. 

Garra — pronounced gar-r-r-ra — means to 
hook or grab hold of, and patas means "feet," so 
I take it that this pestilential insect is so named 
because it grabs hold and holds tight with its feet. 
If this interpretation be correct, it is well named, 
because the manner in which it lays hold with 
its feet justifies its name, not to mention the 
tenacity with which it hangs on with its head. 
It is very difficult to remove one from the skin 
before it gets " set," and after fastening itself 
securely the operation of removing it is both 
irritating and painful. If it should ever need 
renaming some word should be found that sig- 
nifies " grab hold and hang on with both head 
and feet." 

They cling to the grass and leaves of bushes 

in small clusters after the manner of a swarm of 

bees, and the instant anything touches one of 

these clusters they let go all hold and drop off 

18 



onto the object, and proceed at once to scatter in 
every direction ; taking care, however, not to fall 
a second time. We had noticed a few bites, but 
paid no special attention to them, as we were 
becoming accustomed to being " bitten." Many 
of them had now reached the skin, however, and 
they claimed our particular attention for the re- 
mainder of the day. We inquired how best to 
get rid of them and were told that our clothes 
would have to be discarded. The loss of the 
clothes and the wood-ticks adhering to them 
was not a matter of such immediate consequence 
as those which had already found their way 
through the seams and openings and reached the 
skin. We were told that to bathe in kerosene or 
turpentine would remove them if done before 
they got firmly set, and that if they were not re- 
moved we would be inoculated with malaria and 
thrown into a violent fever, for being unaccli- 
mated, their bite would be poisonous to our sys- 
tems. Of course there was not a drop of kerosene 
or turpentine aboard, so the direst consequences 
were inevitable. Our trip was fast becoming in- 
teresting, and with the cheering prospects of 
malarial fever and smallpox ahead, we began to 
wonder what was next ! All interest in the prog- 
ress of the journey was now entirely subverted, 
and, with the mosquitoes and garrapatas to play 
the accompaniment to other bodily woes and 
discomforts, sufficient entertainment was in 
store for the coming night. 
19 



After digging out our trunks and changing our 
clothes we thoughtlessly laid our cast-off gar- 
ments on top of the cargo, with the result that 
in a short time the whole boat was infested with 
the little pests. Our one comforting hope was 
that they might torture the Mexicans, but this 
proved to be a delusive consolation, for we found 
that the natives were accustomed to their bites 
and paid but little attention to them. I refrain 
from detailing the events and miseries of the 
night following, because I wish to forget them. 
Not least among our annoyances was the evident 
relish with which the Mexicans regarded our 
discomforts during daylight, and the blissful 
serenity with which they slept through it all 
at night. As they lay there calmly asleep while 
we kept a weary vigil with the mosquitoes and 
ticks, I was strongly tempted to push one of 
them off into the water just to disturb his ag- 
gravating rest. They laughed uproariously at 
our actions and imprecations over the wood- 
ticks, but the next laugh was to be at their ex- 
pense, as will be seen further along. 

Next morning at sunrise (from sunrise to sunset 
is regarded by the Mexicans as the duration of 
a day's work) they began unloading the cargo 
and carrying it half a mile over the shoal. The 
strength and endurance of the men were remark- 
able, considering their meagre fare. Each man 
would carry from two to three hundred pounds 
on the back of his neck and shoulders the entire 
20 



distance of half a mile without stopping to rest. 
By two o'clock in the afternoon the cargo was 
transferred and the boat dragged over the shoal. 
In this latter undertaking we all lent a hand. 
If any of our friends at home could have wit- 
nessed this scene in which we took an ac- 
tive part, with our trousers rolled up, wading 
in mud and water nearly up to our knees, they 
might well have wondered what Eldorado we 
were headed for. By the time the hoatmen got 
the cargo reloaded it was time for supper, and 
they were too tired to continue the voyage that 
night. 

We slept intermittently during the night, and 
fought mosquitoes between dozes. We started 
next morning about five o'clock. This was the 
beginning of the fourth day out and we had 
covered less than six miles. One of the men 
told us that on the last trip they took ten days 
in making the same distance. It began to look 
as though we would have to go on half rations 
in order to make our food supply last through 
the journey. We moved along the channel with- 
out interruption during the day, and late in the 
afternoon reached the point where the channel 
opened into a large lake several miles long. We 
camped that night by the lakeside, — the Mexi- 
cans having apparently forgotten their promise 
to pursue the journey at night. They slept on 
the bare ground, while we remained in the boat. 
A brisk breeze blew from the lake, so we had no 
21 



mosquitoes to disturb the first peaceful night's 
sleep we had enjoyed since the smallpox scare. 

During the night we made the acquaintance of 
another native pest, known as the " army-ant," 
a huge black variety measuring upwards of half 
an inch in length, the bite of which produces 
much the same sensation as the sting of a hor- 
net or scorpion, though the pain is of shorter 
duration. The shock produced by the bite, even 
of a single one, is sudden and violent, and there 
is nothing that will cause a Mexican to disrobe 
with such involuntary promptness as the attack 
of one of these pestiferous insects. They move 
through the country at certain seasons in great 
bodies, covering the ground for a space of from 
fifty feet to a hundred yards wide, and perhaps 
double the length. If a house happens to stand 
in their way they will rid it completely of rats, 
mice, roaches, scorpions, and even the occupants. 
They invade every crevice from cellar to garret, 
and every insect, reptile and animal is compelled 
either to retreat or be destroyed. Nothing will 
cause a household to vacate a dwelling more sud- 
denly at any time of the night or day, than the 
approach of the dreaded army-ant. 

The boatmen were all asleep on the bank 
of the lake, while we, remaining aboard the boat, 
had finished our after-supper smoke and were 
preparing to retire. Suddenly our attention was 
attracted by a shout from the four Mexicans al- 
most simultaneously, which echoing through the 
22 



woods on the night air, produced the weirdest 
sound I had ever heard. It was a cry of sudden 
alarm and extreme pain. In an instant the four 
natives were on their feet, and their shirts were 
removed with almost the suddenness of a flash 
of lightning. They all headed for the boat and 
plunged headlong into the water. The army- 
ant being unknown to us, and not knowing the 
cause of their sudden alarm, we were uncertain 
whether they had all gone crazy or were fleeing 
from some wild beast. They scrambled aboard 
the boat, and one of the regrets of my life was 
that I could n't understand Spanish well enough 
to appreciate the full force of their ejaculations. 
All four of them jabbered in unison — rubbing 
first one part of the body and then another — 
for fully ten minutes, and judging from their 
maledictions and gestures, I doubt if any of them 
had a good word to say about the ants. It was 
now our turn to laugh. In half an hour or so 
they ventured back to the land and recovered 
their clothes, the army of ants having passed on. 
They were up most of the night nursing their 
bites, and once our interpreter called out and 
asked them if ants were as bad as garrapatas. 
One of the men was so severely poisoned by 
the numerous bites that he was obliged to return 
home the next day. 

At about eight o'clock next morning we arrived 
at a little village, or settlement, and after wan- 
dering around for half an hour our party re- 
23 



turned to the boat, but the boatmen were nowhere 
to be seen. We waited there until nearly noon, 
and then started out in search of them. They 
were presently found in the store, all drunk and 
asleep in a back room. We aroused them, but 
they were in no condition to proceed, and had no 
intention of doing so. We remained there just 
twenty-eight hours, and when we again started 
on our journey it was with only three boatmen, 
none of them sober enough to work. The wind 
blew a steady gale in our faces all the afternoon, 
and we had traveled only about four miles by 
nightfall. We had now been out more than six 
days and had not covered one quarter of the dis- 
tance to Tuxpam. At this rate it would take us 
nearly a month to reach there. 

About three o'clock next day we went ashore 
at a little settlement, and upon learning that 
there was to be a haile (a dance) that night, the 
boatmen decided to stay until morning. It was 
an impoverished looking settlement of perhaps 
forty huts, mostly of bamboo with thatched roofs 
of grass. A hut generally had but one room, 
where the whole family cooked, ate and slept on 
the dirt floor. This room had an aperture for 
ingress and egress, the light and ventilation be- 
ing admitted through the cracks. We did not 
see a bed in the entire village, and in passing 
some of the huts that night we observed that 
the entire family slept on the hard dirt floor in 
the center of the room with no covering. In one 
24 



hovel, measuring about 12 x 14 feet, we counted 
eleven people asleep on the floor,— three grown 
persons and eight children, while the family pig 
and the dog reposed peacefully in one corner. 
All were dressed in the same clothes they wore 
in the daytime, including the dog and pig. The 
garments of the men usually consist of a pair 
of knee-drawers, — generally of a white cotton 
fabric,— a white shirt-waist, leather sandals fas- 
tened on their feet with strings of rawhide, and 
a sombrero, the latter usually being more ex- 
pensive than all the rest of the wearing apparel. 
The natives here are generally very cleanly, and 
change and wash their garments frequently. The 
women spend most of their time at this work, 
and when we landed we counted fourteen women 
washing clothes at the edge of the lake. 

The dance began about nine o'clock and most 
of the participants, both men and women, were 
neatly attired in white garments. The men 
were very jealous of their girls, though for what 
reason it was hard to understand. Many writers 
rhapsodise over the beauty and loveliness of the 
Mexican women, but I could n't see it. There 
are rare exceptions, however. The dance-hall 
consisted of a smooth dirt floor with no covering 
overhead, and the orchestra— a violin and some 
sort of a wind-instrument— was mounted on a 
large box in the center. A row of benches ex- 
tended around the outside of the "dancing- 
ground." The men all carried their machetes 
25 



(large cutlasses, the blades of which range from 
eighteen to thirty-six inches in length) in sheaths 
at their side, and two or three of the more gaily 
dressed wore colored sashes around their waists. 
All wore their sombreros. The dance had not 
progressed for more than an hour when one of 
the villagers discovered that his lady was en- 
gaging too much of the attention of one of our 
boatmen, and this resulted in a quarrel. Both 
men drew their machetes and went at one 
another in gladiator fashion. It looked as if 
both would be carved to pieces, but after slash- 
ing at each other for awhile they were separated 
and placed under arrest. It was discovered that 
one of them had received an ugly, though not 
dangerous, wound in his side, while the other 
(our man) had the tendons of his left wrist 
severed. The men were taken away and the 
dance proceeded as orderly as before. We now 
had only two boatmen left. In discussing the 
matter at home a year later a member of our 
party remarked that "it was a great pity that 
the whole bunch was n't put out of commission; 
then we would have returned to Tampico, and 
from there home." One of the natives very 
courteously invited us to get up and take part 
in the dance, but after the episode just men- 
tioned we decided not to take a chance. 

Our boatmen spent all the next day in fruit- 
less endeavor to secure another helper, and we 
did not start until the day after at about nine 
26 



o'clock — a needless delay of forty-two hours; 
but they were apparently no more concerned 
than if it had been ten minutes. We were learn- 
ing to measure time with an elastic tape. Ober 
complains of the poor traveling facilities in Mex- 
ico, and says that " in five days' diligent travel " 
he accomplished but 220 miles. We had been 
out longer than that and had not covered twenty 
miles. 

The wind remained contrary all day, as usual, 
and having but two men, our progress— or lack 
of progress— was becoming painful. Our pro- 
visions, too, were exhausted, and we were reduced 
to the regular Mexican fare of dried beef and 
boiled rice. We took a hand at the paddles, but 
our execution was clumsy and the work uncon- 
genial. Someone suggested that in order to 
make our discomfiture complete it ought to rain 
for a day or two, but the boatman reassured us 
upon this point, saying that it never rained there 
at that season of the year, — about the only state- 
ment they made which was verified by facts. 
Having made but little progress that day, we 
held a consultation after our supper of dried beef 
and rice, and decided that the order of procedure 
would have to be changed. The wind had ceased 
and the mosquitoes attacked us in reinforced 
numbers. We were forced to remain in a much 
cramped position aboard the boat on top of the 
cargo, because every time we attempted to stretch 
our legs on shore we got covered with wood- 

27 



ticks. It occurred to some of us to wonder what 
there could possibly be in the whole Republic 
that would compensate us for such annoyance 
and privation, and even if we should happen to 
find anything desirable in that remote district, 
how could we get in to it or get anything out 
from it? Certainly none of us had any intention 
of ever repeating the trip for any consideration. 
Thus far we had not seen a rubber-tree, vanilla- 
vine, coif ee-tree, or anything else that we would 
accept as a gift. 

Next morning we went over to a nearby hut, 
and our interpreter calling in at the door asked 
of the woman inside if we could get some break- 
fast. " No hay " (none here) said she, not even 
looking up from her work of grinding corn for 
tortillas.^ He then asked if we could get a cup of 
hot coffee, to which she again replied " No hay." 
In response to a further inquiry if we could get 
some hot tortillas he got the same " No hay" al- 
though at that moment there was one baking 
over the fire and at least a dozen piled up on a 
low bench, which, in lieu of a table, stood near 
the fireplace,— which consisted of a small excava- 
tion in the dirt floor in the center of the room. The 
fire was made in this, and the tortillas baked on 
a piece of heavy sheetiron resting on four stones. 
The interpreter said that we were hungry and 
had plenty of money to pay for breakfast, but 
the only reply he got was the same as at first. 

1 See description of the tortilla on p. 36. 
28 



We therefore returned to the hoat and break- 
fasted on boiled rice and green peppers, the dried 
beef strips having given out. Soon after our 
meal I had a severe chill, followed by high fever. 
Of course we all feared that it was the begin- 
ning of smallpox or malaria, or both. Another 
member of the party was suffering from a racking 
headache and dizziness, which, he declared, were 
the first symptoms of smallpox. There was no 
doctor nearer than Tuxpam or Tampico. The 
aspect was therefore gloomy enough from any 
point of view. 

We made but little progress during the day. 
That night after going over the various phases 
of the situation and fighting mosquitoes— which 
would bite through our garments at any point 
where they happened to alight— with no prospect 
of any rest during the entire night, we found 
ourselves wrought up to such a mutinous state 
of mind that it appeared inevitable that some- 
thing must be done, and that quickly. We di- 
rected our interpreter to awaken the owner of 
the boat and explain the facts to him, which he 
did. He told him that we had become desperate 
and that if not landed in Tuxpam in forty-eight 
hours we purposed putting both him and his 
man ashore, dumping the cargo, and taking the 
boat back to Tampico; that we would not be 
fooled with any longer, and that if he offered any 
resistance both he and his man would be ejected 
by main force. The interpreter was a tall, power- 
29 



ful man, standing six feet and two inches in his 
stocking feet, and had a commanding voice. He 
had spent several years on the Mexican frontier 
along the Rio Grande, and understood the Mexi- 
cans thoroughly. He needed only the suggestion 
from us in order to lay the law down to them in 
a manner not to be mistaken for jesting. This 
he did for at least ten minutes with scarcely a 
break of sufficient duration to catch his breath. 
The boatman, thinking that we were of easy-go- 
ing, good-natured dispositions, had been quite 
indifferent to our remonstrances, but he was now 
completely overwhelmed with astonishment at 
this sudden outburst. He begged to be given 
another trial, and said he would not make 
another stop, except to rest at night, until we 
reached Tuxpam. We passed a sleepless night 
with the mosquitoes, frogs, cranes, pelicans, 
ducks— and perhaps a dozen other varieties of 
insects and waterfowl— all buzzing, quaking and 
squawking in unison on every side. In the 
morning my physical condition was not im- 
proved. A little after noon we approached a 
small settlement on the border of the lake, and 
stopped to see if we could obtain some medicine 
and provisions. Our interpreter found what 
seemed to be the principal man of the place, who 
took us into his house and provided us with a very 
good dinner and a couple of quart bottles of Ma- 
deira. I had partaken of no food for nearly thirty- 
six hours, and was unable now to eat anything. 
30 



We explained to him about the smallpox episode 
and he agreed that I had all the customary 
symptoms of the disease. I wrote a message to 
be despatched by courier to Tampico and from 
there cabled home, but on second thought it 
seemed unwise to disturb my family when it was 
utterly impossible for any of them to reach me 
speedily, so I tore it up. We arranged for a 
canoe and four men to start that night and 
hurry us back to Tampico with all possible speed. 
The member of our party who had been suffer- 
ing with headache and dizziness had eaten a 
hearty dinner, and having had a few glasses of 
Madeira he was indifferent as to which way he 
went. During the afternoon I slept for several 
hours and about seven o'clock awoke, feeling 
much better. Not desiring to be the cause of 
abandoning the trip, I had them postpone the 
return to Tampico until morning. Meanwhile 
we paid off our boatman, as we had determined 
to proceed no further with him under any condi- 
tions. He remained over night, however. In 
the morning I felt much better and the fever had 
left me. We decided to change our plans for re- 
turn, and to go "on to Tuxpam;" in fact this 
had now become our watchword. We had had 
enough of travel by water, and finding a man 
who claimed to know the route overland we 
bargained with him to furnish us with four 
horses and to act as guide, the price to be $100. 
He also took along an extra guide. The distance, 
31 



he said, was seventy-five miles, and that we 
would cover it in twenty-four hours. The high- 
est price that a man could ordinarily claim for 
his time was fifty cents per day, and the rental 
of a horse was the same. Allowing the men 
double pay for night-travel each of them would 
earn $1.50, and the same returning, making in 
all $6 for the men; and allowing the same for 
six horses, their hire would amount to $18, or 
$24 in all. We endeavored to reason him down, 
but he was cunning enough to appreciate the 
urgency of our needs, and would n't reduce the 
price a penny. 

It is worthy of note that in this part of the 
country there is no fixed value to anything when 
dealing with foreigners. If you ask a native the 
price of an article, or a personal service, he will 
very adroitly measure the pressure of your need 
and will always set the figure at the absolute 
maximum of what he thinks you would pay, with 
no regard whatever for the value of the article 
or service to be given in exchange. If you need 
a horse quickly and are obliged to have it at any 
cost, the price is likely to be four times its value. 
In bartering with the natives it is wise to assume 
an air of utter indifference as to whether you 
trade or not. I once gave out notice that I 
wanted a good saddle-horse, and next morning 
when I got up there were seventeen standing at 
my front door, all for sale, but at prices ranging 
from two to five times their value. I dismissed 
32 



them all, saying that I did n't need a horse at 
the time, and a few days later bought the best 
one of the lot for exactly one quarter of the orig- 
inal asking-price. We were told in Tampico of 
a recent case where an American traveler 
employed a man to take his trunk from the 
hotel to the depot, a distance of less than half a 
mile, without agreeing upon a price, and the 
man demanded $10 for the service, which the 
traveler refused to pay, as the regular and well- 
established price was but twenty-five cents. The 
trunk was held and the American missed his 
train. The case was taken to court and the 
native won,— the judge holding that the imme- 
diate necessity of getting the trunk to the sta- 
tion in time to catch the train justified the 
charge, especially in that it was for a personal 
service. The native had been cunning enough 
to carry the trunk on his back instead of hauling 
it with his horse and wagon, which stood at the 
front door of the hotel. The traveler was de- 
tained four days in trying the suit, and his law- 
yer charged him $50 for services. In these parts 
it is therefore always well to make explicit agree- 
ments on prices in advance, especially for per- 
sonal service to be performed. 

In purchasing goods in large quantities one is 
always expected to pay proportionately more, be- 
cause they reason that the greater your needs 
the more urgent they are. I discovered the 
truth of this statement when purchasing some 
33 



oranges at the market-place in Tampico. The 
price was three cents for four oranges. I picked 
up twelve and gave the man nine cents, but he 
refused it and asked me for two reals, or twenty- 
five cents. I endeavored to reason with him, by 
counting the oranges and the money back and 
forth, that at the rate of four for three cents, a 
dozen would come to medio y quartilla (nine 
cents), and nearly wore the skin off the oranges 
in the process of demonstration; but it was of 
no use. Finally I took four, and handing him 
three cents took four more, paying three cents 
each time until I had completed the dozen. I 
put them in my valise and left him still counting 
the money and remonstrating. 

We agreed to the extortionate demand of $100 
for the hire of the horses and men, only on con- 
dition that we were to be furnished with ample 
provisions for the trip. Leaving our baggage 
with the boat to be delivered at Tuxpam we 
started on our horseback journey just after sun- 
set, expecting to reach Tuxpam by sunset next 
day. The trail led through brush and weeds for 
several miles, and in less than ten minutes we 
were covered with wood-ticks from head to foot. 
Shortly after nightfall we entered a dense forest 
where the branches closed overhead with such 
compactness that we couldn't distinguish the 
movement of our hands immediately before our 
eyes. The interpreter called to the guide in front 
and asked if there were any wild animals in these 
34 



woods; in response we received the cheering in- 
telligence that there were many large panthers 
and tigers, and that further on along the coast 
there were lions. After that we momentarily 
expected to be pounced upon by a hungry tiger 
or panther from some overhanging bough. The 
path was crooked, poorly defined, and very 
rugged. Our faces were frequently raked by the 
branches of trees and brush, and the blackness 
seemed to intensify as we progressed. We loos- 
ened the reins and allowed the horses to take 
their course in single file. The guide in front 
kept up a weird sort of yodling cry which must 
have penetrated the forest more than a mile. It 
was a cry of extreme lonesomeness, and is said 
by the natives to ward off evil spirits and wild 
animals. I can well understand the foundation 
for such a belief, particularly in regard to the 
animals. The pestiferous wood-ticks were an- 
noying us persistently, and it looked as though 
we had changed for the worse in leaving the boat. 
At length we came out into the open along the 
Gulf, and traveled several miles down the coast 
by the water's edge. It was in the wooded dis- 
trict at our right along here that the lions were 
so abundant, but I have my doubts if there was 
a lion, or tiger, or panther anywhere within a 
mile of us at any time. In my weakened phys- 
ical condition the exertion was proving too 
strenuous, and at three o'clock in the morning 
we all stopped, tied the horses at the edge of the 
35 



thicket and lay down for a nap beside a large log 
that had been washed ashore on the sandy beach. 
The natives assured us that the lions were less 
likely to eat us if we remained out in the open. 
A stiff breeze blowing from off the water whirled 
the dry sand in eddies all along the beach. We 
nestled behind the log to escape the wind and 
sand, and in a few minutes were all fast asleep. 
When we awoke a couple of hours later we were 
almost literally buried in sand. The wag of the 
party said it would be an inexpensive burial, and 
that he did n't intend ever to move an inch from 
the position in which he lay. 

Unaccustomed as we were to horseback riding, 
it required the most Spartanlike courage to 
mount our horses again. After going a few miles 
it came time for breakfast and our interpreter 
asked one of the guides to prepare the meal. 
He responded by reaching down into a small bag 
hanging at his saddle-horn and pulling out four 
tortillas, one for each of us. This was the only 
article of food they offered us. 

It may be explained that the tortilla (pro- 
nounced torteeya) is the most common article of 
food in Mexico. It is common in two different 
senses,— in that it is the cheapest and least pal- 
atable food known, and also that it is more gen- 
erally used than any other food there. In 
appearance the tortilla resembles our pancake, 
except that it is thinner, tougher, and usually 
larger around. The size varies from four to 
36 



seven inches in width, and the thickness from an 
eighth to a quarter of an inch. It is made of 
corn, moistened in hmewater in order to remove 
the hulls, then laid on the flat surface of a metate 
(a stone-slab prepared for the purpose), and 
ground to a thick doughy substance by means 
of a round stone-bar held horizontally with one 
hand at each end and rubbed up and down the 
netherstone, washboard fashion. The women 
usually do this work, and grind only as much at 
a time as may be required for the meal. The 
dough — which contains no seasoning of any 
kind— not even salt— is pressed and patted into 
thin cakes between the palms of the hand, and 
laid on a griddle or piece of sheetiron (stoves be- 
ing seldom seen) over a fire to bake. They are 
frequently served with black beans— another 
very common article of food in Mexico— and by 
tearing them into small pieces they are made to 
serve the purpose of knives, forks and spoons in 
conveying food to the mouth,— the piece of tor- 
tilla always being deposited in the mouth with 
the food which it conveys. Among the poorer 
classes the tortilla is frequently the only food 
taken for days and perhaps weeks at a time. It 
is never baked crisp, but is cooked just enough 
to change the color slightly. When served hot, 
with butter — an extremely rare article in the 
rural districts — it is rather agreeable to the 
taste, but when cold it becomes very tough and in 
taste it resembles the sole of an old rubber shoe. 
37 



Such was the food that was offered us in ful- 
fillment of the promise to supply us with an 
abundance of good provisions for the journey. 
I had eaten scarcely anything for three days, and 
with the improvement in my physical condition 
my appetite was becoming unmanageable. We 
found that it would probably be impossible to 
obtain food until we reached Tamiahua, a small 
town about thirty miles down the coast. It 
would be tiresome and useless to dwell further 
upon the monotony of that day's travel along the 
sands of the barren coast, with nothing to eat 
since the afternoon before. Suffice it to say that 
we all were still alive when we arrived at Tamia- 
hua at about three o'clock in the afternoon. 
Meanwhile we had been planning how best to 
get even with the Mexicans for having bled us 
and then starved us. Fortunately, we had paid 
only half the sum in advance, and the remain- 
ing half would at least procure us a good meal. 
We went to a sort of inn kept by an accommo- 
dating native who promised to get up a good 
dinner for us. We told him to get everything 
he could think of that we would be likely to 
enjoy, to spare no expense in providing it, and 
to spread the table for six. 

Tamiahua is situated on the coast, cut off 
from the mainland by a small body of water 
through which the small freight-boats pass in 
plying between Tampico and Tuxpam. There 
happened to be a boat at the wharf, just arrived 
38 



from Tampico with a load of groceries destined 
for Tuxpam. The innkeeper suggested that 
there might be some American goods aboard, and 
we all went down to interview the boatman. 
He informed us that the cargo was consigned to 
a grocer in Tuxpam and that he couldn't sell 
anything, but when our interpreter slipped a 
couple of silver pesos (dollars) into his palm he 
told us to pick out anything we wanted. We 
took a five-pound can of American butter, at $1 
a pound, an imported ham at fifty cents a pound, 
a ten-pound tin box of American crackers at 
fifty cents a pound, four boxes of French sar- 
dines, two cans of evaporated cream, and a se- 
lection of canned goods, the bill amounting in 
all to $22.25. This was all taken to the inn and 
opened up. The innkeeper was instructed to 
keep what we could n't eat. The butter was so 
strong that he kept the most of that, with more 
than half of the crackers. At five o'clock we 
were served with a dinner of fried chicken, fried 
ham and eggs, canned baked beans, bread and 
butter, coffee, and native fruit. The two guides 
were invited to sit down with us to what was 
doubtless the most sumptuous feast ever set 
before them. After dinner we called for a dozen 
of the best cigars that the town afforded, and 
two were handed to each one, including the 
guides. After lighting our cigars we called for 
the bill of the entire amount, which, including 
the sum of $22.25 for the boatman, came to 
39 



$38.50. We called the innkeeper into the room, 
counted out $50 on the table, and paid him $38.50 
for the dinner and the boatman's bill; then gave 
him $5 extra for himself, while the remaining 
$6.50 was handed to the head guide. He almost 
collapsed with astonishment, and wondered what 
he had done to deserve such a generous honora- 
rium; but his amazement was increased ten-fold 
when the interpreter informed him that this was 
the balance due him. A heated argument ensued 
between them, and the guide drawing his machete 
attempted to make a pass at the interpreter, 
with the remark that he would kill every gringo 
(a vulgar term applied to English-speaking peo- 
ple by the Mexicans in retaliation for the term 
greaser) in the place. The innkeeper pounced 
upon him with the quickness of a cat and pin- 
ioned his arms behind him. His companion see- 
ing that he was subdued made no move. The 
innkeeper called for a rope and in less than five 
minutes the belligerent Mexican was bound hand 
and foot and was being carried to the lockup. 
The interpreter explained the whole matter to 
the innkeeper, who sided with us, of course. 
The effect of the five-dollar tip was magical. 
He went to the judge and pleaded our case so 
eloquently that that dignitary called upon us in 
the evening and apologized on behalf of his 
countrymen for the indignity, assuring us inci- 
dentally that the offender would be dealt with 
according to the law. We presented him with 
40 



an American five-dollar gold piece as a souvenir. 
He insisted that we remain over night as his 
guests, and in the morning piloted us through 
the village. The first place visited was the ca- 
thedral, a large structure standing in the center 
of the principal street. Its seating capacity was 
perhaps five times greater than that of any 
other building in the village. It contained a 
number of pieces of beautiful old statuary, and 
on the walls were many magnificent old paint- 
ings, of enormous dimensions, with splendid 
frames. They are said to have been secretly 
brought to this obscure out-of-the-way place 
from the City of Mexico during the French in- 
vasion, but for what reason they were never 
removed seems a mystery. 

A fiesta was in progress in honor of the birth- 
day of some saint, and it was impossible to get 
anyone to take us to Tuxpam, only a few miles 
distant. We desired to continue via the laguna, 
and engaged two men to take us in a sort of gon- 
dola, with the understanding that we should 
leave just after sunset. We gave the men a dol- 
lar apiece in advance, as they wished to purchase 
a few articles of food, etc., for the journey, and 
they were to meet us at the inn at sunset. Nei- 
ther of them appeared at the appointed time, and 
in company with the innkeeper we went in 
search of them. In the course of half an hour 
we found one of the men behind a hut, drunk, 
and asleep. He had drank a whole quart of 
41 



aguardiente and the empty bottle lay at his side. 
We left him and went to the boat, where we 
found the other man stretched out full length 
in the bottom with a half-filled bottle beside him. 
We concluded to start out and to put the man 
at the paddle as soon as he became suf- 
ficiently sober. The innkeeper directed us as 
best he could and we pushed off from the shore 
about an hour after nightfall, expecting to reach 
Tuxpam by eight o'clock next morning. We 
were told to paddle out across the lake about a 
mile to the opposite shore, where there was a 
channel leading into a large lake beyond. The 
water was very shallow most of the way, and 
filled with marshgrass and other vegetation, 
which swarmed with a great variety of water- 
fowl. Disturbed by our approach they kept up 
a constant quacking, squawking and screeching 
on all sides, which, reverberating on the still 
night-air, made the scene dismal enough. There 
was a haile in progress near the shore in the 
village and as we paddled along far out in the 
lake we could see the glimmer of the lights re- 
flected along the surface of the water and could 
hear the dance-music distinctly. When we had 
gotten well out into the lake the drunken man 
in the bottom of the boat waked up and inquired 
where he was and where we were taking him. 
Seeing the lights in the distance and hearing 
the music he suddenly remembered that he had 
promised to take his girl to the dance, and de- 
42 



manded that he be taken back to shore. Upon 
being refused he jumped out into the water and 
declared that he would wade back. We had 
great difficulty in getting him back into the boat 
and came near capsizing in the operation. The 
ducking he got sobered him up considerably and 
at length we got him at the helm with the paddle 
and told him to head for the mouth of the channel. 
He neared the shore to the right of the channel 
and following along near the water's edge was 
within a quarter of a mile of the village before 
we realized what his trick was. The interpreter 
took the paddle away from him and told him of 
the dire consequences that would follow if he 
did n't settle down and behave himself. After 
turning the boat around and following along the 
shore for half a mile he promised to take us to 
Tuxpam if we would agree to get him another 
bottle of aguardiente there and also a present 
with which to make peace with his girl. Upon 
being assured that we would do this he seemed 
quite contented and set to work in earnest. 
As we entered the narrow channel a large dog 
ran out from a nearby hut, and approaching the 
boat threatened to devour us all. Provoked at 
this interference the Mexican made a swish at 
him in the dark with the paddle, but missing the 
dog he struck the ground with such violence 
that the handle of the paddle broke off near the 
blade, and both Mexican and paddle tumbled 
headlong into the water with a splash. This 
43 



provoked the dog to still greater savagery, and 
jumping from the bank into the boat he attacked 
the interpreter with the ferocity of a tiger. He 
was immediately shot and dumped into the 
water. Meanwhile our gondolier had clambered 
up on the bank and the two pieces of the paddle 
had floated off in the darkness. What to do 
was a serious question. The native at the hut 
had probably been aroused by the shot and was 
likely to come down on us with more ferocity 
than the dog. We could not therefore appeal to 
him for another paddle. It was so dark that we 
could scarcely see one another in the boat, and 
it was exceedingly fortunate that none of the 
party was shot instead of the dog. While we 
were debating the various phases of our predica- 
ment the Mexican — who had now become quite 
sober after his second sousing — unsheathed his 
machete and cut a pole, with the aid of which he 
soon had us a safe distance down the channel. 
A few miles further on we got out at a hut by 
the side of the channel and bought a paddle, for 
which we paid three times its value. 

The channels from here on were generally 
overhung on both sides with brush and the 
boughs of trees, and the darkness was so intense 
that it was impossible to distinguish any object 
at a distance of three feet. The man at the 
paddle set up the same doleful yodling cry that 
we had heard in the woods, and continued it at 
intervals all through the night. He advised us 
44 



to be careful not to allow our hands to hang 
over the edge of the boat, as the channel 
abounded with alligators. As a matter of fact, 
I doubt if there was an alligator within miles of 
us. The native was doubtless sincere in his 
statement, because he had perhaps heard others 
say that there were alligators there. The story 
of the lions, tigers and panthers in the woods 
along the coast was also undoubtedly a myth 
which like many other sayings had become a 
popular belief from frequent repetition. The 
same is true of dozens of tales one hears in 
Mexico, and about Mexico when at home. For 
example, the fabulous stories about the vast for- 
tunes to be made in planting vanilla, rubber 
trees and coffee ; but I shall treat of these 
matters in their proper place further on. 

We finally arrived at Tuxpam in the morning 
at nine o'clock. As I reflected upon the experi- 
ences of the past two weeks I shuddered at the 
very thought of returning. It is doubtful if all 
the riches in this tropical land could have 
tempted me again to undergo the tortures and 
anxiety of body and mind that fell to my portion 
on that journey. It was an epoch long to be 
remembered.^ 

Tuxpam is a pleasant sanitary town of perhaps 

1 After a lapse of twelve years I can recall the inci- 
dents and sensations of the journey from Tampico to 
Tuxpam as connectedly and vividly as though it had 
been but a week ago. 

45 



five thousand inhabitants situated on the banks 
of the beautiful Tuxpam River a few miles inland 
from the coast. The town is built on both sides 
of the river, which carries off all the refuse and 
drainage to the ocean below. This being a nar- 
rative of experiences rather than a history of 
towns and villages, I have purposely refrained 
from long-drawn-out topographical descriptions. 
The reader is doubtless familiar with the general 
details of the crude architecture that character- 
izes all Mexican villages and cities, and a detailed 
recital of this would be a needless repetition of 
well-known facts, for there is a monotonous 
sameness in the appearance of all Mexican towns 
and villages. For the purpose of this narrative 
it matters little to the reader whether the people 
of Tuxpam are all Aztecs, Spaniards, French or 
Indians, though in point of fact they consist of a 
sprinkling of all of these. Tuxpam itself is 
simply a characteristic Mexican town, but it 
should be here permanently recorded that it has 
within its precincts one of the most adorable 
women to whom the Lord ever gave the breath 
of life: Mrs. Messick, the widow of the former 
American consul, is a native Mexican of ebony 
hue, but with a heart as large and charitable and 
true as ever beat in a human breast. She is far 
from prepossessing in appearance, and yet to 
look upon her amiable features and to converse 
with her in her broken English is a treat long to 
be remembered. Her commodious home is a 
46 



veritable haven for every orphan, cripple, blind 
or otherwise infirm person that comes within 
her range of vision, and her retinue of servants, 
with herself at their head, are constantly en- 
gaged in cooking, washing and otherwise caring 
for the comforts and alleviating the sufferings of 
those unfortunates who are her special charges. 
She furnishes an illustrious example of the spirit 
of a saint inhabiting a bodily form, and it is al- 
most worth the trip to Mexico to find that the 
native race can boast a character of such noble 
instincts. 

Arriving at this picturesque town we went at 
once to the hotel. This hostelry consisted of a 
chain of rooms built upon posts about nine feet 
from the ground, and extending around the cen- 
tral market-place. There is a veranda around 
the inside of the square, from which one may 
obtain a good view of the market. The stands, 
or stalls, are around the outer edge under the 
tier of rooms, while in the center men and 
women sit on the ground beside piles of a great 
variety of fresh vegetables and other perishable 
articles for household use. There is perhaps no 
better selection of vegetables to be found in any 
market in America than we saw here. 

The partitions dividing the tier of rooms were 
very thin and extended up only about two-thirds 
of the way from the floor to the ceiling, so there 
was an air-space connecting all the rooms over- 
head. One could hear every word spoken in 
47 



the adjoining room on either side. The furni- 
ture consisted of a cot-bed, a wash-stand and a 
chair. We each procured a room, and as we 
looked them over and noted the open space 
overhead, someone remarked that " it would be 
a great place for smallpox." Having had no 
sleep the night before, and being very tired 
after sitting in a cramped position all night in 
the boat, we retired shortly after reaching town. 
At about four o'clock in the afternoon I was 
awakened by a vigorous pounding at my door, 
and my two companions, who were outside, 
shouted, " Get up quick ! ! there is a case of small- 
pox in the next room!" I jumped up quickly 
and in my dazed condition put on what clothing 
I could readily lay my hands on, and snatching 
up my shoes and coat ran out on the veranda. 
After getting outside I discovered that I had 
gotten into my trousers hind side before and 
had left my hat, collar, shirt and stockings 
behind, but did not return for them. We all 
beat a hasty retreat around the veranda to the 
opposite side, of the court, or square, and the 
people in the market-place below having heard 
the pounding on the door, and seeing me run- 
ning along the veranda in my deshabille con- 
cluded that the place was afire. Someone gave 
the alarm of fire, and general pandemonium 
ensued. The women-peddlers and huxsters in 
the market hastily gathered up such of their 
effects as they could carry and ran out of the 
48 



inclosure into the street. In remarkable con- 
trast to the usual solicitude and thoughtfulness 
of motherhood, I saw one woman gather up a 
piece of straw-matting with about fifty pounds 
of dried shrimp and scurry out into the street, 
leaving her naked baby sitting howling on the 
bare ground. Vegetables and all sorts of truck 
were hurriedly dumped into bags and carried 
out. Happily this episode occurred in the after- 
noon when there was comparatively little doing, 
and very few pedestrians in the place; for had it 
happened in the early morning when all the 
people are gathered to purchase household ne- 
cessities for the day, a serious panic would have 
been inevitable. About this time our inter- 
preter appeared, and three soldiers in white uni- 
forms came rushing up to us and enquired 
where the fire was. My companions explained 
to the soldiers, through the interpreter, that it 
was only a practical joke they had played on 
me. It now became my turn to laugh, for they 
were both placed under arrest and taken before 
the magistrate, charged with disturbing the 
peace and starting a false alarm of fire. When 
the interpreter explained the matter to the 
magistrate that official lost his dignity for a 
moment and laughed outright. He was a good- 
na^ired old fellow (an unusual characteristic, I 
understand, among Mexican magistrates) and 
appreciated the joke even more than I did. He 
recovered his dignity and composure long enough 
49 



to give us an impressive warning not to play 
any more such pranks, and dismissed the case. 

Our baggage did not arrive until five days 
later, and was soaking wet, as the hoatman said 
he had encountered a gale in which he had 
barely escaped inundation. 

There was an American merchant in Tuxpam 
by the name of Robert Boyd, whose store was 
the headquarters of all Americans, both resi- 
dent and traveling. Had we talked with Mr. 
Boyd before going to Mexico there would have 
been no occasion for writing this narrative. He 
was an extremely alert trader and in his thirty 
years' residence, by conducting a general store 
and trafficking in such native products as chicle 
(gum,— pronounced chickly), hides, cedar, rub- 
ber and vanilla, which he shipped in small quan- 
tities to New York, he had accumulated about 
$50,000 (Mexican). We had expected to make on 
an average that sum for every day we spent in 
Mexico, and were astonished that a man of his 
commanding appearance and apparent ability 
should be running a little store and doing a 
small three-penny^ business. Three months 

iThe customary measurement of money values in 
Mexico is three cents, or multiples of three, where the 
amount is less than one dollar. The fractional currency 
is silver-nickels, dimes, quarters, halves, and large cop- 
per pennies. Three cents is a quartilla, six cents a medio, 
and twelve cents a real. Although five-cent pieces and 
dimes are in common use, values are never reckoned by 
five, ten, fifteen or twenty cents. Fifteen being a mul- 

50 



later we would have concluded that any Ameri- 
can who could make fifty thousand dollars by 
trading with Mexicans for thirty years is highly 
deserving of a bronze monument on a conspic- 
uous site. For clever trading in a small way, 
the Mexican is as much ahead of the average 
Yankee as our present methods of printing are 
ahead of those employed in Caxton's time. They 
are exceedingly cunning traders and will thrive 
where even the Italian fruit-vender would starve. 
When we informed Mr. Boyd that we had come 
in search of vanilla, rubber and coffee lands he 
must have felt sorry for us ; in fact he admitted 
as much to me a few months later when I knew 
him better. With his characteristic courtesy, 
however, he told us of several places that we 

tiple of three would be called real y quartilla, one real 
and a quartilla. In having a quarter changed one gets 
only twenty-four cents no matter whether in pennies, or 
silver and pennies, A fifty-cent piece is worth but forty- 
eight cents in change, and a dollar is worth only ninety- 
six cents in change, provided the fractional coins are all 
of denominations less than a quarter. If a Mexican, of 
the peon class, owes you twenty-one cents and he should 
undertake to pay it (which would be quite improbable) 
he would never give you two dimes and a penny, or four 
five-cent pieces and a penny; he would hand you two 
dimes and four pennies (two reals), and then wait for you 
to hand him back three cents change. If you were to 
say veinte y uno centavos (twenty-one cents) to him he 
would n't have the slightest idea what you meant ; but 
he would understand real y medio y quartilla,— being ex- 
actly twenty-one cents. 

51 



might visit. We learned for the first time that 
the three industries require entirely different 
soils and altitudes. For coffee-land he recom- 
mended that we go up the Tuxpam River to what 
was known as the Mesa (high tahle-lands) dis- 
trict, while for vanilla-land he recommended 
either Misantla or Papantla, further down the 
coast ; and rubber trees, he said, could be grown 
with moderate success in certain localities 
around Tuxpam. He did not discourage us, 
because it was not consonant with his business 
interests to dissuade American enterprise and 
investments there, no matter how ill-advised the 
speculation might be. Others before us had 
come and gone; some had left their money, 
while others had been wise enough to get back 
home with it, and stay there. Some investors 
had returned wiser, but never was one known to 
return richer. All this, however, we did not 
learn until later. We made several short 
journeys on horseback, but found no lands that 
seemed suitable for our purposes. There were 
too many impediments in the vanilla industry, 
— not least among which was the alacrity with 
which the natives will steal the vanilla-beans 
as fast as they mature. In fact, a common 
saying there is, "catch your enemy in your 
vanilla-patch," — for you would be justified in 
shooting him at sight, even though he happened 
there by accident. It requires a watchman to 
every few dozen vines (which are grown among 
52 



the trees) and then for every few watchmen it 
needs another watchman to keep an observing 
eye on them. Again, the vanilla country is 
uncomfortably near the yellow fever zone. 

As to rubber, we found very few trees in 
bearing, and the few scattering ones we saw that 
had been "tapped," or rather "gashed," in order 
to bleed them of their milk, were slowly dying. 
True, the native method of extracting the milk 
from the trees was crude, but they did not 
appear hardy. 

One of the principal articles of export from 
this section is chicle. The reader may not be 
aware that a great deal of our chewing-gum 
comes from this part of Mexico, and that it is a 
thoroughly pure and wholesome vegetable prod- 
uct. The native Chielero is the best paid man 
among the common laborers in Mexico. Tying 
one end of a long rope around his waist he climbs 
up the tree to the first large limb — perhaps 
from thirty to sixty feet —and throwing the other 
end of the rope over the branch lets himself 
down slowly by slipping the rope through his left 
hand, while with the right hand he wields a short 
bladed machete with which he chops gashes in 
the tree at an angle of about forty-five degrees, 
which leading into a little groove that he makes 
all the way down, conducts the sap down to the 
base of the tree, where it is carried into a basin 
or trough by means of a leaf inserted in a gash 
in the tree near the ground. This is a very 
53 



hazardous undertaking and requires for its per- 
formance a dexterous, able-bodied man. A sin- 
gle misstroke may sever the rope and precipi- 
tate the operator to the ground. In this way a 
great number of men are killed every year. The 
sap is a thick, white creamy substance, and is 
boiled down in vats the same as the sap from the 
maple tree. When it reaches a certain thickness 
or temperature it is allowed to cool, after which 
it is made up into chunks or squares weighing 
from ten to forty pounds each. It is then 
carried to market on mule-back. The crude 
chicle has a delightful flavor, which is entirely 
destroyed by the gum-manufacturers, who mix 
in artificial flavors, with a liberal percentage of 
sugar. If the gum-chewer could obtain crude 
chicle with its delicious native flavor he (or she) 
would never be content to chew the article as 
prepared for the trade. 

Rubber is produced in the same way as chicle, 
and the milk from the rubber tree is scarcely 
distinguishable, except in flavor, from that of 
the chicle-producing tree. The latter, however, 
grows to much greater size and is more hardy. 
It abounds throughout the forests in the low- 
lands. The native rubber trees die after being 
gashed a few times, and those we saw in bearing 
were very scattering. You might not see a 
dozen in a day's travel. 

The easiest way to make money on rubber 
trees is to write up a good elastic article on the 
54 



possibilities of the industry, form a ten or twenty 
million dollar corporation and sell the stock to 
the uninitiated, — if there are any such left. It 
would be a debatable question with me, however, 
which would be the more attractive from an in- 
vestment point of view,— stock in a rubber com- 
pany in Mexico, or one in Mars. Both would have 
their advantages ; the one in Mexico would pos- 
sess the advantage of closer proximity, while the 
one in Mars would have the advantage of being 
so far away that one could never go there to be 
disillusioned. The chances for legitimate returns 
would be about the same in both places. It 
seems a pity that any of those persons who ever 
bought stock in bogus Mexican development com- 
panies should have suffered the additional hu- 
miliation of afterwards going down there to see 
what they had bought into. 

It is surprising that up to the present time no 
one has appeared before the credulous invest- 
ing public- with a fifty-million dollar chicle cor- 
poration, for here is a valuable commodity that 
grows wild in the woods almost everywhere, and 
a highly imaginative writer could devote a whole 
volume to the unbounded possibilities of making 
vast fortunes in this industry. 

While I was in Mexico a friend sent me some 
advertising matter of one of these development 
companies that was paying large dividends on 
its enormous capital stock from the profits on 
pineapples and coffee, when in point of fact there 
55 



was not a coffee-tree on its place, and it was 
producing scarcely enough pineapples to supply 
the caretaker's family. 

In regard to coffee, we found that some Ameri- 
can emigration company appeared to be making 
a legitimate effort to test the productivity of 
that staple, and had sent a number of thrifty 
American families into Mexico and settled them 
at the mesa,^ several miles inland from Tuxpam. 
They had cleared up a great deal of land and put 
out several thousand coffee-plants. There are 
many reasons why this crop cannot be exten- 
sively and profitably raised in this part of Mex- 
ico,— and for that matter, I presume, in any 
other part. Foremost among the many obsta- 
cles is the labor problem. The native help is 
not only insufficient, but is utterly unreliable. 

1 In 1907, I received a letter from my foreman at the 
ranch, saying that yellow fever had spread throughout 
the Tuxpam valley district, and that upon its appearance 
in the American settlement at the mesa the whole colony 
of men, women and children literally stampeded and fled 
the country, taking with them only the clothes that were 
on them. The old gentleman (American) from whom I 
bought my place, and who had lived there for forty-seven 
years prior to that time, fell a victim to the yellow 
plague, together with his two grown sons. Thirty years 
before his wife and two children had fallen victims to 
smallpox. Thus perished the entire family. It is said 
that this is the first time in many years that yellow fever 
had visited that district. I scarcely ever heard of it 
while there, though Vera Cruz, a few miles further 
south, is a veritable hot-bed of yellow fever germs. 

56 



It is at picking-time that the greatest amount of 
help is required, and even if it were possible to 
rely upon the laborers, and there were enough 
of them, there would not be sufficient work to 
keep them between the harvest-seasons. It 
would be totally impracticable to import la- 
borers ; the expense and the climate would both 
be prohibitive. Again, the price of labor here 
has increased greatly of late years, without a 
corresponding appreciation in the price of coffee.^ 

Neither vanilla, coffee nor rubber had ever 
been profitably raised in large quantities and 
we therefore decided that under the existing 
circumstances and hindrances we would dismiss 
these three articles from further consideration. 

If we had been content to return home and 
charge our trip to experience account, all would 
have been well,— but we pursued our investiga- 
tions along other lines. The possibilities of 
the tobacco industry claimed our attention for 
awhile— it also claimed a considerable amount 
of money from one of my companions. Some- 
one (perhaps the one who had the land for sale) 
had recently discovered that the ground in a 
certain locality was peculiarly suited to the 

1 There is nearly an acre of coffee in full bearing on my 
place, but I have not taken the trouble even to have it 
picked. Occasionally the natives will pick a little of it 
either for home use or for sale, but they do not find 
it profitable, and so most of the f iruit drops off and goes 
to waste. 

57 



growth of fine tobacco, which could be raised at 
low cost and sold at fabulous prices. We learned 
that a large tract of land in this singularly- 
favored district was for sale; so thither we went 
in search of information. The soil was rich and 
heavily wooded; it looked as though it might 
produce tobacco or almost anything else. I 
neither knew nor cared anything about tobacco- 
raising and the place did not therefore interest 
me in the least. One of my companions, how- 
ever, had been doing a little figuring on his own 
account, and had calculated that he could buy 
this place, hire a foreman to run it, put in from 
five to eight hundred acres of tobacco that year, 
and that the place would pay for itself and be 
self-sustaining the second year. By the third 
year he would have a thousand acres in tobacco, 
and the profits would be enormous. It would 
not require his personal attention, and he could 
send monthly remittances from home for ex- 
penses, and probably come down once a year on 
a pleasure trip. Parenthetically, by way of as- 
surance to the reader that the man had not 
entirely lost his reason, I may say that we 
learned in Tuxpam that of all routes and modes 
of travel to that place we had selected by far 
the worst; that the best way was to take a 
Ward Line Steamer from New York to Havana, 
and from there around by Progreso, Campeche, 
and up the coast to Vera Cruz, thence to Tux- 
pam. From Tuxpam the steamers go to Tam- 
58 



pico, then back to Havana and New York. 
However, one cannot count with certainty on 
landing at Tuxpam, as the steamers are obliged 
to stop outside the bar and the passengers and 
cargo have to be lightered over. The steamers 
often encounter bad weather along the coast, 
and it frequently happens that passengers and 
freight destined for Tuxpam are carried on up 
to Tampico. 

My friend had gotten his money easily and was 
now unconsciously planning a scheme for spend- 
ing it with equal facility. The more we tried to 
dissuade him the more convinced he was of the 
feasibility of the plan. We argued that no one 
had ever made any money in tobacco there, and 
that it was an untried industry. He said that 
made no difference; it was because they did n't 
know how to raise tobacco. He would import a 
practical tobacco-man from Cuba — which he 
finally did, under a guarantee of $200 a month 
for a year — and that he would show the Mexi- 
cans how to raise tobacco. He bought the place, 
arranged through a friend in Cuba for an expert 
tobacco-raiser, and sent couriers through the 
country to engage a thousand men for chopping 
and clearing. He was cautioned against attempt- 
ing to clear too much land, as it was very late. 
The rainy season begins in June, and after that 
it is impossible to burn the clearings over. The 
method of clearing land here is to cut down the 
trees and brush early in the spring, trim off the 
59 



branches and let them lie until thoroughly dry. 
In felling a forest and chopping up the brush 
and limbs it forms a layer over the entire area, 
sometimes five or six feet deep. Under the hot 
sun of April and May, during which time it 
rarely rains more than a slight sprinkle, this be- 
comes very dry and highly inflammable. Early 
in June the fires are set, and at this season the 
whole country around is filled with a hazy at- 
mosphere. The heat from the bed of burning 
tinder is so intense that most of the logs are con- 
sumed and many of the stumps are killed ; thus 
preventing them from sprouting. Every foul 
seed in the ground is destroyed and for a couple 
of years scarcely any cultivation is required. 

Our would-be tobacco-raiser paid no heed to 
advice or words of warning ; he was typical of 
most Americans who seek to make fortunes in 
Mexico, — they have great difficulty in getting 
good advice, but it is ten times more difficult 
to get them to follow it. You rarely obtain 
trustworthy information from your own coun- 
trymen who have investments there, for the 
chances are fifty to one that they are anxious to 
sell out, and will paint everything in glowing hues 
in the hope that they may unload their burdens 
on you. Even if they have nothing to sell, they 
are none the less optimistic, for they like to see 
you invest your money. Wretched conditions 
are in a measure mitigated by companionship ; 
in other words, " Misery loves company." 
60 



Hereafter I shall refer to the man who bought 
the tobacco land as Mr. A., and to my other com- 
panion as Mr. B. 

Mr. A. was delayed in getting his foreman and 
had the customary difficulty in hiring help. 
Three hundred men was all he could muster at 
first, and they were secured only by paying a 
liberal advance of twenty-five per cent, over the 
usual wages. They began cutting timber about 
the 28th of April, — the season when this work 
should have been finished, and continued until 
the rainy season commenced, when scarcely any 
of the clearing had been burned; and after the 
rains came it was impossible to start a fire, so 
the whole work of felling upwards of four hun- 
dred acres of forest was abandoned. Every stub 
and stump seemed to shoot up a dozen sprouts, 
and growing up through the thick layer of brush, 
branches and logs, they formed a network that 
challenged invasion by man or beast. The labor 
was therefore all lost and the tobacco project 
abandoned in disgust. 

I was told by one of the oldest inhabitants — 
past ninety — that it had never once failed to 
rain on San Juan's (Saint John 's) Day, the 24th 
of June. Sometimes the rainy season begins a 
little earlier, and occasionally a little later, but 
that day never passes without bringing at least 
a light shower. Of course it was in accord with 
my friend's run of luck that this should be the 
year when the rainy season began prematurely; 
61 



but the truth of the matter is, it was about the 
most fortunate circumstance that could have 
occurred; for as it turned out he lost only the 
money laid out for labor, together with the 
excess price paid for the land above what it was 
worth; whereas, had everything gone well he 
was likely to have lost many thousands of dollars 
more.^ 

In the meantime I had been looking the field 
over industriously, and had concluded that the 
sugar and cattle industries promised the surest 
and greatest returns. I heard of a ranch, with 
sugar-plantation, for sale up in the Tuxpam 
valley. It was owned by an American who had 
occupied it forty-seven years, during which time 
he had made enough to live comfortably and 
educate two sons in American schools. He was 
well past seventy and wished to retire from the 
cares of active business, — which I regarded as a 
justifiable excuse for selling. We visited the 

lA few years later Mr. A. sold his unimproved land for 
about one-third of what it cost him, so that now I am 
the only one of the party to retain any permanent en- 
cumbrances there. Be it said, however, to the credit 
of my injudicious investment, that there has never been 
a year when I have not received a small net return, over 
expenses ; and that is far more than I can say for my farm 
in Massachusetts, with all its modem equipments. It has 
lately been discovered that that section of Mexico is rich 
in petroleum, and in 1908 I leased the oil-privileges alone 
for a sum nearly as large as I expected ever to realize 
for the whole place. 

62 



place and found the only American-built house 
we had seen since leaving home. The place was 
in a fairly good state of repair, though the 
pasture lands and canefields had been allowed to 
deteriorate. The whole place was for sale, 
including cattle, mules, wagons, sugar-factory, 
tenement houses, machinery and growing crops; 
in fact, everything went. The price asked 
appeared so low that I was astonished at the 
owner's modesty in estimating its value. I 
accepted his offer on the spot, paying a small 
sum down to bind the bargain,— fearing that he 
would change his mind. It was not long, 
however, before I changed my estimate of his 
modesty, and marveled at his boldness in having 
the courage to ask the price he did. On our way 
back to town my companions argued that I was 
foolish to try to make money in sugar or cattle 
raising; that there was no nearby market for 
the cattle, and that the Cuban sugar was 
produced so abundantly and so cheaply that 
there would be no profit in competing with it in 
the American market. This was perfectly sound 
logic, as testified to by later experiences, but it 
fell upon deaf ears. I had been inoculated with 
the sugar and cattle germ as effectively as my 
friend had been with the tobacco germ, and 
could see nothing but profit everywhere. Mr. A. 
was to have a Cuban tobacco man, and why 
could n't I have an experienced Cuban sugar 
man? I expected to double the magnitude of 
68 



the canefields, as the foreman — who promised 
to remain — had declared that this could be done 
without crowding the capacity of the factory. I 
would also import some shorthorn cattle from 
the United States, and figured out that I should 
need a whole carload of farming implements. 

It may be remarked that almost without ex- 
ception the American visitor here is immedi- 
ately impressed with the unbounded possibilities 
of making vast fortunes. The resources of the 
soil appear almost limitless. The foliage of the 
trees and shrubs is luxuriant the year round, and 
the verdure of the pastures and all vegetation is 
inspiring at all seasons. The climate is delightful, 
even in midsummer, and with such surround- 
ings and apparent advantages for agricul- 
tural pursuits one marvels at the inactivity and 
seeming stupidity of the natives. After a few 
months' experience in contending with the mul- 
tiplicity of pests and perversities that stand 
athwart the path of progress, and becoming in- 
oculated with the monotony of the tropical cli- 
mate, one can but wonder that there should be 
any energy or ambition at all. The tendency of 
Americans is always to apply American energy 
and ideas to Mexican conditions, with the result 
that nothing works harmoniously. The country 
here is hundreds of years behind our times, and 
cannot be brought into step with our progress- 
iveness except by degrees. Our modern methods 
and ideas assimilate with those of Mexico very 
64 



slowly, if at all. It is almost impossible to de- 
velop any one locality or industry independent of 
the surroundings. The truth is, if you would 
live comfortably in Mexico (which in these parts 
is quite beyond human possibility) you must live 
as Mexicans do, for they are clever enough, and 
have lived here long enough, to make the best of 
conditions. If you would farm successfully in 
Mexico, you must farm precisely as they do, for 
you will eventually find that there is some well- 
grounded reason for every common usage; and 
if you would make money in Mexico, stay away 
entirely and dismiss the very thought of it. 
Pure cream cannot be extracted from chalk and 
water,— though it may look like milk,— because 
the deficiency of the necessary elements forbids 
it ; no more can fortunes be made in this part 
of Mexico, because they are not here to be made, 
as every condition forbids their accumulation. 
The impoverished condition of the people is such 
that a large percentage of the families subsist 
on an average income of less than ten cents a 
day, silver. 

Although the peon class are indigent, lazy 
and utterly devoid of ambition they are so by 
virtue of climatic and other conditions that sur- 
round them, and of which they can be but the 
natural outgrowth. The debilitating effects of 
the climate, and the numberless bodily pests 
draw so heavily upon human vitality that it is 
surprising that any one after a year's residence 
65 



there can muster sufficient energy to work at 
all. The natives, after a day's labor will throw 
themselves upon the hard ground and fall asleep, 
calmly submitting to the attack of fleas and 
wood-ticks as a martyrdom from which it is 
useless to attempt to escape. It is a labored 
and painful existence they lead, and it is not to 
be wondered at that smallpox, pestilence and 
death have no terror for them ; indeed, they 
hail these as welcome messengers of relief. 
When by the pangs of hunger they are driven 
to the exertion of work they will do a fair day's 
labor, if kept constantly under the eye of a 
watchman, or capitarif as he is called. One of 
these is required for about every ten or twelve 
workmen; otherwise they would do nothing at 
all. If twenty workmen were sent to the field 
to cut brush, without designating someone as 
captain, they would not in the course of the 
whole day clear a patch large enough to sit 
down on. The best workmen are the Indians 
that come down from the upper-country settle- 
ments. Upon leaving home they take along 
about twelve days' rations, usually consisting 
of black beans and corn ground up together into 
a thick dough and made into little balls a trifle 
larger than a hen's egg, and baked in hot ashes. 
They eat three of these a day,— one for each 
meal,— and when the supply is exhausted they 
collect their earnings and return to their homes, 
no matter how urgent the demand for their 
66 



continued service may be. In two or three 
weeks they will return again with another sup- 
ply of provisions and stay until it is consumed, 
hut no longer. If Thoreau could have seen how 
modestly these people live he would have learned 
a lesson in economic living such as he never 
dreamed of. The frugality of his meagre fare 
at his Walden pond hermitage would have ap- 
peared like wanton luxury by comparison. If 
the virtue of honesty can be ascribed to any of 
these laborers the Indians are entitled to the 
larger share of it. They keep pretty much to 
themselves and seldom inter-marry or mingle 
socially with the dusky-skinned Aztecs. 

It is difficult to get the natives to work as 
long as they have a little corn for tortillas or 
a pound of beans in the house. I have known 
dozens of instances where they would come at 
daylight in search of a day's work, leaving the 
whole family at home without a mouthful of 
victuals. If successful in getting work they 
would prefer to take their day's pay in corn, and 
would not return to work again until it was 
entirely exhausted. Hundreds of times at my 
ranch men applying for work were so emaciated 
and exhausted from lack of nourishment that 
they had to be fed before they were in a fit con- 
dition to send to the field. 

The basic element of wealth is money, and it 
is impossible to make an exchange of commodi- 
ties for money in great quantity where it exists 
67 



only in small quantity. In other words, if you 
would make money it is of first importance that 
you go where there is money. If— as is the 
case — a man will labor hard from sunrise to 
sunset in Mexico, and provision himself, for 
twenty-five cents in gold, it would indicate either 
a scarcity of gold or a superabundance of willing 
laborers, and it must be the former, for the latter 
does not exist. Some have argued that money 
is to be made in Mexico by producing such arti- 
cles as may be readily exchanged for American 
gold, but there are very few articles of mer- 
chandise for which we are obliged to go to 
Mexico, and these cost to produce there nearly 
as much or more than we have to pay for them. 
For example, a pound of coffee in Mexico^ costs 
fifty cents, the equivalent in value to the labor 
of an able-bodied man for twelve hours. There 
is some good reason for this condition, else it 
would not exist. In other words, if it did n't 
cost the monetary value of twelve hours' work 
(less the merchant's reasonable profit, of 
course) to produce a pound of coffee, it would 
not cost that to buy it there. It does not seem 
logical, therefore, that it can be produced and 
sold profitably to a country where a pound of 
this commodity is equal in value to less than 
two hours of a man's labor. If it were so easy 
and profitable to raise coffee, every native might 

lit will be understood, of course, that in speaking of 
Mexico I refer only to the district where I visited. 

68 



have his own little patch for home use, and 
possibly a few pounds to sell. In order to be 
profitable, commodities must be turned out at a 
low cost and sold at a high cost; but here is a 
case where some visionary Americans have 
thought to get rich by working directly against 
the order of economic and natural laws. I have 
not consulted statistics to ascertain how the 
Mexican exports to the United States compare 
with their imports of our products, but it is a 
significant fact, as stated at the beginning of 
this narrative, that the highest premium ob- 
tainable for American money is for eastern 
exchange, used in settling balances for imports 
of American goods. The needs of the average 
Mexican are very small beyond the products of 
his own soil, and if the agricultural exports from 
their eastern ports were large the merchants 
would have but little difficulty in purchasing 
credits on New York, or any important eastern 
or southern seaport. 

I had the good fortune not to be able to make 
any satisfactory arrangement for a practical 
sugar-maker from Cuba. I was more fortunate 
than my friend Mr. A., in not having any 
friend there to look out for me. Thus I saved 
not only the cost of an expert's services, which, 
comparatively speaking, would have been a tri- 
fling item, but was held up in making the con- 
templated extensions and improvements until 
my sugar-fever had subsided and I had regained 
69 



my normal senses, after which I was quite con- 
tented to conduct the place in its usual way 
with a few slight improvements here and there. 
I had not in so short a time become quite recon- 
ciled, however, to the idea that the place could 
not be run at a profit; but figured that it could 
be made to yield me a considerable revenue 
above expenses, and that it would afford a de- 
sirable quartering-place for my family on an 
occasional tropical visit in winter. After re- 
turning home later in the season I induced my 
family to return with me in the fall and spend 
a part of the following winter there; and al- 
though we experienced the novelty on Christmas- 
day of standing on our front porch and picking 
luscious ripe oranges from the trees,— one of 
which stands at each side of the steps,— I have 
never again been able to bring my persuasive 
powers to a point where I could induce them to 
set foot on Mexican soil. It is largely due to 
the abhorrence of smallpox, malaria, snakes, 
scorpions, tarantulas, garrapatas, fleas, and a 
few other minor pests and conditions to which 
they object. Mosquitoes, however, did not molest 
us at the ranch. 

Once while we were at the ranch my wife 
was told by one of the servants that there was 
a woman at the front door to see her. Upon 
going into the hall she found that the woman 
had stepped inside and taken a seat near the 
door. She arose timidly, with a bundle in her 
70 



arms— which proved to be a habe— and spoke, 
but Mrs. Harper could not understand a word 
she said. The maid had entered the hall imme- 
diately behind my wife, and, as she spoke both 
Spanish and English, the woman explained 
through her that the baby was suffering with 
smallpox, and that she had heard that there 
was an American woman there who could cure 
it. The resultant confusion in the household 
beggars description. Every time I mention 
Mexico at home I get a graphic rehearsal of this 
scene. The poor woman had walked ten miles, 
carrying her babe, and thought she was doing 
no harm in bringing it in and sitting down to 
rest for a moment. She was put into a boat 
and taken down the river to Tuxpam by one of 
the men on the place who had already passed 
through the stages of this disease, and under 
the treatment of a Spanish physician whom I 
had met there the child recovered and was sent 
back home with its mother. 

It may be observed that since arriving at 
Tuxpam I have appeared to neglect my friend 
Mr. B., but, although so far as this narrative is 
concerned he has not as yet been much in evi- 
dence, he was by far the busiest man in the 
party. Being the only unmarried man in our 
company he had not been long in Mexico when 
he began to busy himself with an industry in 
which single men hold an unchallenged mo- 
nopoly, and one that is far more absorbing than 

71 



vanilla, rubber, coffee, sugar and tobacco all 
combined. The immediate cause of his diver- 
sion was due to a visit that we all made to the 
large hacienda of a wealthy Spanish gentleman of 
education and refinement, who had a very beau- 
tiful and accomplished daughter but recently 
returned home with her mother from an ex- 
tended tour through Europe, following her 
graduation from a fashionable and well-known 
ladies' seminary in America. I have made the 
statement in the foregoing pages that no 
American fortune-hunter had been known to 
return home from here richer than when he 
came, but later on we shall see that this no 
longer remains a truth. For the present, how- 
ever, as long as we are now discussing problems 
of vulgar commerce, we shall leave Mr. B. undis- 
turbed in his more engaging pursuit, and return 
to his case later. 

Next to silver, corn is the staple and standard 
of value in Mexico, though its price fluctuates 
widely. Everybody, and nearly every animal, 
both untamed and domestic, and most of the in- 
sects, feed upon this article. It is the one prod- 
uct of the soil that can be readily utilized and 
converted into cash in any community and at 
any season. The price is usually high, often 
reaching upwards of the equivalent of $1 a 
bushel. It is measured not by the bushel, but 
by the fanega, which weighs 225 pounds. It may 
appear a strange anomaly that the principal na- 

72 



tivG product should be so high in a soil of such 
wonderful productivity. An acre of ground will 
produce from fifty to seventy-five bushels, twice 
a year. It is planted in June as soon as the rains 
break the long, monotonous dry season which 
extends through March, April and May, and is 
harvested early in October; then the same 
ground is planted again in December for har- 
vesting early in April. The ground requires 
no plowing and, if recently cleared, no weeding ; 
so all that is necessary to do is to plant the corn 
and wait for it to mature. It sounds easy and 
looks easy, but, as with everything else, there 
are a few obstacles. Corn is planted in rows, 
about the same distance apart as in America, and 
is almost universally of the white variety, as 
this is the best for tortillas. The planting is ac- 
complished by puncturing the ground with a 
hardwood pole, sharpened at one end. The hole 
is made from four to six inches deep, when the 
top of the pole is moved from one side to another 
so that the point loosens up the subsoil and 
makes an opening at the bottom of the hole the 
same width as that at the top. The corn is 
then dropped in and covered with a little dirt 
which is knocked in by striking the point of the 
pole gently at the opening. The moisture, how- 
ever, would cause it to sprout and grow even if 
not covered at all. The difficulties now begin 
and continue successively and uninterruptedly 
at every stage of development to maturity, and 
73 



even until the corn is finally consumed. The 
first of these difficulties is in the form of a small 
red ant which appears in myriads and eats the 
germ of the kernels as soon as they are planted. 
When the corn sprouts there is a small cut-worm 
that attacks it in great numbers. When the 
sprouts begin to make their appearance above 
the ground there is a blackbird lying in wait at 
every hill to pull it up and get the kernel. These 
birds, which in size are between our crow and 
blackbird, appear in great numbers and would 
destroy a ten-acre field of corn in one day if not 
frightened away. They have long sharp beaks, 
and insatiable appetites. Following these the 
army-worm attacks the stalk when knee high, 
and penetrating it at the top or tassel-end stops 
its growth and destroys it. These ravages con- 
tinue until the corn begins to tassel, if any is so 
fortunate as to reach that stage. When the 
ears appear another worm works in at the silk, 
and a little later a small bird resembling our 
sapsucker puts in his claim to a share in the 
crop. Beginning at the outer edge of the field 
and proceeding down the row from one hill to 
another, he penetrates the husks of almost every 
ear with his needlelike bill, and the moment the 
milky substance of the corn is reached the ear 
is abandoned and another attacked. When punc- 
tured in this way the ear withers and dries up 
without maturing. The succession is then taken 
up by the parrots and parrakeets, which abound 
74 



in Mexico. They may be seen in flocks flying 
overhead or hovering over some field, constantly 
chattering and squawking, at almost any hour 
of the day. When the corn begins to mature 
the raccoons appear from the woods, and enter- 
ing a field at night they eat and destroy the corn 
like a drove of hogs. As a means of protection 
against these pests many of the natives keep a 
number of dogs, which they tie out around the 
field at night, and which keep up an almost con- 
stant barking and howling. Finally, just as the 
corn has matured and the kernels are hardening 
the fall rains begin, and often continue for days 
and even weeks with scarcely an interruption. 
The water runs down into the ear through the 
silks and rots the corn. In order to prevent this 
it is necessary to break every stalk just below 
the ear and bend the tops with the ears down so 
the water will run off. Later it is husked and 
carried to the crib, when it is subjected to the 
worst of all the evils, the black weevil. The 
eggs from which this insect springs are depos- 
ited in the corn while in the field and commence 
to hatch soon after it is harvested. I have per- 
sonally tested this by taking an ear of corn from 
the field and after shelling it placed the corn in 
a bottle, which was corked up and set away. In 
about three weeks the weevils began to appear, 
and in six weeks every kernel was destroyed. 
At first I wondered why the Mexicans usually 
planted their corn in such small patches and so 
75 



near the house, but in view of the foregoing facts 
this is easily explained. Almost the same vexa- 
tious conditions prevail in nearly everything that 
one attempts to do in this country, the variety 
and numbers of enemies and hindrances varying 
with each undertaking. There is a hoodoo lurk- 
ing in every bush, and no matter which way the 
stranger turns he finds himself enmeshed in a 
veritable entanglement of impediments and ag- 
gravations. 

All along and up and down the banks of the 
Tuxpam River, and in other more remote locali- 
ties, there are countless wrecks and ruins of 
sugar mills, distilleries and other evidences of 
former American industry, which mark the last 
traces of blighted ambitions and ruined fortunes 
of investors. The weeds and bushes have over- 
grown the ruins and tenderly sheltered them 
from the sun's rays and the view of the unin- 
quisitive passer-by. They have become the 
silent haunts of wild animals, scorpions and 
other reptiles. At the visitor 's approach a flock 
of jaybirds will immediately set up a clamorous 
chattering and cawing in the surrounding trees, 
as if to reproach the trespasser who invades the 
lonely precincts of these isolated tomb-like 
abodes. They tell their own tale in more 
eloquent language than any writer could com- 
mand. With each ruin there is a traditional 
and oftentimes pathetic story. In some cases 
the investor was fortunate enough to lose only 
76 



his money, but in many instances the lives along 
with the fortunes of the more venturesome were 
sacrificed to some one or other of the various 
forms of pestilence which from time to time 
sweep over the country. 

Among the native fruit products in this 
section the orange and the mango hold first 
rank, with bananas and plantains a close second. 
In close proximity to almost every native hut 
one will find a small patch of plantain and 
banana stalks. The plantain is made edible by 
roasting with the skin on, or by peeling and 
splitting it in halves and frying it in lard or 
butter. 

Of all tropical fruits the mango is perhaps the 
most delicious. Its tree grows to enormous 
size and bears a prolific burden of fruit. In front 
of my house are a great number of huge mango 
trees which are said to have been planted more 
than two hundred years ago. The fruit picked 
up from under a single tree amounted to a trifle 
over one hundred and sixty-one bushels. Unlike 
the banana or even our American peaches, pears 
and plums, the mango is scarcely fit to eat unless 
allowed to ripen and drop off the tree. Much of 
the delicacy of its flavor is lost if plucked even 
a day before it is ready to fall. When picked 
green and shipped to the American markets it 
is but a sorry imitation of the fruit when allowed 
to ripen on the tree. It ripens in June, and it 
is almost worth one's while to make a flying 
77 



trip to the tropics in that month just to sit 
heneath the mango tree and eat one 's fill of this 
fruit four or five times a day. 

The only native fruit that ever could be profit- 
ably raised here for the American market is the 
orange. The Mexican orange is well known for 
its thin, smooth skin and superior flavor and 
sweetness. The trees thrive in the locality of 
Tuxpam, and bear abundantly from year to year 
without the least cultivation or attention. On 
my place thousands of bushels of this fruit drop 
off the trees and go to waste every year, there 
being no market for it. I made an experimental 
shipment of 1,000 boxes to New York on one of 
the Ward Line Steamers. After selecting, wrap- 
ping and packing them with the greatest care, 
and prepaying the freight, in due time I received 
a bill from the New York commission house 
for $275 (gold) for various charges incidental to 
receiving and hauling them to the public dump. 
The steamer, however, had been delayed several 
days. The ratio of profit on this transaction is 
a fair example of the returns that one may rea- 
sonably expect from an investment in any 
agricultural enterprise in Mexico.^ If ever we 
get rapid steamer service between Tuxpam and 

iWhile this volume was in process of issue there ap- 
peared in several leading newspapers a full-page adver- 
tisement by some Mexican orange-grove company, which 
contained many of the most extraordinary offers. For 
example, the promoters agree, for a consideration of 

78 



Galveston or New Orleans, it is my belief that 
orange-growing could be made profitable in this 
country, but until then it would be useless to 
consider the orange-growing industry. 

Having had some experience in farming in my 
boyhood, I thought I knew more about corn- 
raising than the natives did and that I would 
demonstrate a few things that would be useful 
to them ; so I instructed my foreman to procure 
a cultivator and cornplanter from the United 
States. At Tuxpam I found an American plow 
which had been on hand perhaps for some years, 
and was regarded by the natives as a sort of 

$250, to plant a grove of fifty orange trees and to care 
for them two years; then turn the grove over to the 
investor, who receives $250 the first year, $375 the second 
year, and so on until the tenth year, when the grove of fifty 
trees nets an income of $5,500 (gold) per annum, which 
will be continued for upwards of four hundred years. 
The company's lands are located "where the chill of 
frost never enters, where the climate excels that of 
California, where you are 500 miles nearer American 
markets than Los Angeles and 60 days earlier than 
Florida crops — this is the spot where you will own an 
orange grove that will net you $5,500 annually without 
toil, worry or expense. We will manage your grove, if 
you desire, care for the trees, pick, pack and ship your 
oranges to market, and all you will have to do is to bank 
the check we send to you. ' ' It would appear that anyone 
with $250 who refuses this offer must indeed be heedless 
of the coming vicissitudes of old age ; for the promoters 
pledge their fortunes and their sacred honor that "when 
your grove is in full bearing strength you need worry no 
longer about your future income." 

79 



curiosity. No merchant had had the rashness, 
however, to stock himself with a cultivator or 
cornplanter. The foreman was ordered to plow 
ahout fifteen acres of ground and plant it to corn 
as an experiment. The natives hearing of the 
undertaking came from a distance to see the op- 
eration. They thought it was wonderful, but 
did n't seem to regard it with much favor. The 
piece was planted in due season, and the rows 
hoth ways were run as straight as an arrow. It 
required the combined efforts of all the extra 
help obtainable in the neighborhood to rid the 
corn of the pests that beset it, but after culti- 
vating it three times and "laying it by," the 
height and luxuriance of growth it attained were 
quite remarkable. Standing a trifle over six 
feet tall I could not reach half the ears with the 
tips of my fingers. The ground was rich, and as 
mellow as an ash-heap and appeared to rejoice 
at the advent of the plow and cultivator. One 
night in August there came a hard rain, accom- 
panied by the usual hurricanes at this season, 
and next morning when I went out, imagine my 
astonishment to find that not a hill of corn in 
the whole field was standing ! Its growth was 
so rank and the ground so mellow that the 
weight of one hill falling against another bore 
it down, and the whole field was laid as flat as 
though a roller had been run over it. It was 
all uprooted and the roots were exposed to 
the sun and air. We didn't harvest an ear 
80 



of corn from the whole fifteen acres. The 
other corn in the neighborhood withstood the 
gale without any damage. This experience ex- 
plained why it is that the natives always plant 
corn in hard ground, and also furnishes addi- 
tional proof that it is usually safe to adhere 
pretty closely to the prevailing customs, and ex- 
ercise caution in trying any innovations. 

After clearing a piece of land for corn the na- 
tives will plant it for a couple of years, then 
abandon it to the weeds and brush for awhile. 
They then clear another piece, and in two or 
three years the abandoned piece is covered with 
a growth of brush sufficiently heavy so that 
when cut and burned the fire destroys such 
seeds as have found their way into the piece. 
After land here has been planted for a few years 
it becomes so foul with weeds that it would be 
impossible for a man with a hoe to keep them 
down on more than an acre. It is surprising 
how rapidly and thickly they grow. The story 
of the southern gentleman who said that in his 
country the pumpkin vines grew so fast that 
they wore the little pumpkins out dragging them 
over the ground would seem like a plausible 
truth when compared with what might be said 
of rapid growth in Mexican vegetation. They 
say that the custom of wearing machetes at all 
times is really a necessity, as when a man goes 
to the field in the morning there is no knowing 
but that it may rain and the weeds grow up and 
81 



smother him before he can get back home. I 
am, however, a little skeptical on this point. 

A serious difficulty which has to be reckoned 
with in Mexico is the utter disregard that many 
of the natives have for the property rights of 
others. Pigs, chickens, calves, and even grown 
cattle, are constantly disappearing as quietly and 
effectually as though the earth had opened in the 
night and swallowed them. One evening a na- 
tive came in from a distance of twelve miles to 
purchase six cents' worth of mangos, and being 
otherwise unencumbered in returning home he 
took along a calf which he picked up as he passed 
the outer gate. At another time when the cane 
mill was started in the morning, it was discov- 
ered that a large wrench, weighing probably 
twenty pounds, was missing. There being no 
other mill of similar construction in the commu- 
nity, it was inconceivable that anyone could 
have had any use for the wrench. The foreman 
called the men all together and told them of the 
disappearance. He discharged the whole force 
of more than a hundred men, and said there 
would be no more work until the wrench was 
returned. Next morning it was found in its ac- 
customed place at the mill, and every man was 
there ready to go to work. 

Shortly after buying the ranch I was spending 

the night there, and went out to hunt deer by 

means of a jack,— a small lamp with a reflector, 

carried on top of the head, and fastened around 

82 



the hatband. Assuming that the reader may 
not have had any experience in this lonesome 
sport, I would explain that on a dark night the 
light from the jack being cast into the eyes of 
an animal in the foreground produces a reflec- 
tion in the distance resembling a coal of fire. If 
the wind is favorable, one can approach to within 
thirty to fifty yards of a deer, which will stand 
intently gazing at the light. The light blinds 
the eye of the animal so that the person beneath 
cannot be seen even at a distance of twenty 
feet. The hunter can determine how near he is 
to the game only by the distance that appears 
to separate the eyes. For instance, at 125 to 150 
yards the eyes of a deer will shine in the 
darkness as one bright coal of fire, and as one 
approaches nearer they slowly separate until at 
fifty to sixty paces they appear to be three or 
four inches apart, depending upon the size of 
the animal. It is then time to fire. It is always 
best to proceed against the wind, if there is any, 
otherwise the deer will scent your presence. 
The eye of a calf or burro will shine much the 
same as that of a deer, and one must be cautious 
when hunting in a pasture. I took my shotgun 
with a few shells loaded with buckshot, and 
passing through the canefield came to a clearing 
about half a mile from the house. As I ap- 
proached the opening I sighted a pair of eyes 
slowly moving towards me along the edge of a 
thicket next the clearing, apparently at a dis- 
83 



tance of about seventy-five yards. I knew it 
was not a deer, because that animal will always 
stand still as soon as it sights a lamp. It was 
too large for a cat, and did not follow the cus- 
tomary actions of a dog; but what it was I 
could n't imagine. The two enormous eyes 
came nearer and nearer, moving to first one side 
and then the other, the animal appearing to be 
unaware of my presence. When it approached 
to within perhaps fifty yards of where I stood, I 
thought it was time to shoot, and so cocking 
both hammers of my gun I blazed away, intend- 
ing to fire only one barrel and keep the other 
for an emergency. In my excitement I must 
have pulled both triggers, as both cartridges 
went off with a terrific bang. The recoil sent 
me sprawling on my back in the brush, the gun 
jumping completely out of my hands and landing 
several feet distant. The light was extinguished 
by the fall, and I lay there in utter blackness. 
When I fired, the animal lunged into the thicket 
with a crash, and in the confusion of my own 
affairs immediately following, I heard no more 
sounds. I discovered that I had thoughtlessly 
come away without a match, and being unfa- 
miliar with the territory, had no idea in which 
direction the house stood. Groping around in 
the dark I finally located the gun and struck 
back into the brush in what I supposed to be the 
direction I came. Presently I ran into a dense 
jungle of terrible nettles, which the natives call 
84 



malamujer (bad woman). They are covered 
with needlelike thorns and their sting is ex- 
tremely painful and annoying. I was also cov- 
ered with wood-ticks, which added appreciably 
to my misery. It was cloudy and the night was 
as dark as death. Realizing that I was on the 
wrong route it seemed necessary to spend the 
night there, but I could neither sit nor stand 
with comfort amid the nettles. After pro- 
ceeding five or six hundred yards through these 
miserable prickly objects (which in height ranged 
from two to thirty feet, thus pricking and sting- 
ing me from my face to my knees) I suddenly 
plunged headlong over a steep embankment into 
the water, when I became aware that I had reached 
the river; but whether I was above or below the 
house (which stands back about a thousand 
yards from the river) I could n't tell. After grop- 
ing my way along under the river bank for nearly 
half a mile, during the space of which I again fell 
in twice, I concluded that with my customary luck 
I was headed the wrong way, and so retraced my 
steps and proceeded along down the river for 
nearly a mile, when I came to a landing-place. 
Leaving the river I went in the opposite direction 
a short distance, and soon bumped into some sort 
of a habitation. After feeling my way more than 
half-way around the hut and locating an aper- 
ture (the door) I hallooed at the top of my voice 
four or five times, and receiving no response I 
ventured in only to find the place vacant. Re- 
85 



turning to the open I manoeuvred around until 
I found another hut, where I proceeded to howl 
until the natives woke up. I could n 't imagine 
how I was to make myself understood, as of 
course they could not understand a word of 
English. The man struck a match and seeing 
me standing in the door with a gun in my hand, 
and with my face all scratched and swollen to 
distortion from my explorations in the nettle 
patch, both he and his wife took fright and 
jumping through an opening on the opposite 
side of the room disappeared in the darkness, 
leaving me in sole possession of the place. After 
groping around the room in vain search of a 
match, and falling over about everything in the 
place, I returned to the open air. Meantime the 
clouds had begun to break away and I could see 
the dim outline of a large building a short dis- 
tance beyond, which proved to be the sugar- 
mill. I was now able to get my bearings, and 
discovered that the hut from which the two 
people had fled was one of a number of a similar 
kind which belonged to the place and which 
were provided free for the workmen and their 
families that they might be kept conveniently at 
hand at all times. I was not long in finding the 
main road leading to the house, and when I 
arrived there everybody was asleep. After 
fumbling around all over the place in the dark I 
found a match and discovered that it was 
twenty-five minutes of three. Thus ended my 
86 



first deer-hunt in Mexico. In the morning I 
noticed the zopilotes (vultures) hovering over 
the field in the direction I had taken the night 
before, and upon going to the spot I found an 
enormous full-grown jaguar lying dead about 
ten feet from the edge of the clearing. Several 
shot had penetrated his head and body, and 
luckily, one entering his neck had passed under 
the shoulder-blade and through the heart. The 
natives said it was the only jaguar that had 
been seen in that locality for years, and it was 
the only one I saw during the whole of my 
travels in Mexico. 

That morning it was discovered that every 
hut in the settlement at the mill had been 
vacated during the night, and there was not a 
piece of furniture or a native anywhere in 
sight; the place looked as desolate as a country- 
graveyard. Later in the day we found the 
whole crowd encamped back in the woods, and 
were told that during the night an Evil Spirit 
in the form of a white man with his face and 
clothes all bespattered with blood, had visited 
the settlement, and wielding a huge machete, 
also covered with blood, had threatened to kill 
every man, woman and child in the place. A 
few years prior to that an American had been 
foully murdered at the mill by a native, who 
used a machete in the operation, and this, they 
said, was the second time in five years that the 
murdered man had returned in spirit-form to 
87 



wreak vengeance on the natives. It was more 
than three months before they could all be in- 
duced to return to the houses. I cannot im- 
agine what sort of an apparition it was that 
molested them the first time. The frightened 
native and his wife had doubtless returned and 
alarmed the others with a highly exaggerated 
story, and gathering up their few belongings 
they had fled for their lives. I told the foreman 
the circumstances, but he strongly advised me 
not to attempt to undeceive them, because they 
had a deepseated superstition about the mill, 
and no amount of explanation would convince 
them that the place was not haunted by the 
spirit of the murdered man, especially as this 
was their second alarm. 

The peon class in Mexico are exceedingly 
superstitious and there is scarcely an act or 
circumstance but what portends some evil in 
the mind of one or another. About the only 
thing about which they have no superstitious 
misgivings is the act of carrying off something 
that does not belong to them. 

Late one afternoon, while on a trip out 
through the country, we met an American in 
charge of two Mexican soldiers (in citizen's 
dress) who were returning with him to Tuxpam. 
They said he was a desperate character who had 
broken jail while awaiting trial for murder. He 
was seated astride a bare-backed horse and his 
legs were securely leashed to the body of the 



animal, while his feet were tied together under- 
neath. His arms were tied tightly behind his 
back, and altogether his situation seemed about 
as secure and uncomfortable as it could be made. 
He was not allowed to talk to us, but the officers 
talked rather freely. They said he had recently 
killed an officer who pursued him after breaking 
jail. The poor fellow looked harmless and 
passive, and had a kind, though expressionless, 
face. His eyes and cheeks were deeply sunken 
and he showed unmistakable evidence of long 
suffering. They had captured him by a strata- 
gem, having overtaken him on the road and 
pretending to be amigos (friends) they offered 
to trade horses with him. His steed being much 
fatigued he eagerly grasped the opportunity to 
procure a fresh one, and as soon as he dis- 
mounted he was seized and overpowered. The 
vacant and hopeless expression of the prisoner 
as he sat there bound hand and foot, and unable 
to converse with his own countrymen was 
indeed pathetic, and judging by his looks we 
were convinced that he was not a hardened 
criminal. We therefore determined to look him 
up on our return to town and ascertain the 
facts. Three days later upon returning to 
Tuxpam we learned that soon after we passed 
the party the officers had camped for the night, 
and tying their victim to a tree had taken turns 
at guard duty during the night. At about three 
o'clock in the morning the prisoner had man- 
89 



aged to work himself free from the bonds and 
while the officer on watch was starting a fire to 
warm the breakfast for an early morning start 
the prisoner pounced upon him and seizing his 
revolver struck him a blow on the head which 
laid him out. At this juncture the other officer 
woke up just in time to receive a bullet in his 
breast which despatched him to the other 
world. Taking one of the horses the fugitive 
fled, and up to the time I left Mexico he had not 
sent his address to the police authorities; nor 
did any of them appear very anxious to pursue 
him further. The officer who was first attacked 
came to his senses a little later, but he was 
perhaps more interested in looking to his own 
comfort and safety than in attempting to follow 
the fugitive, with the prospect of sharing the 
fate of his fellow-officer. We were informed 
that the prisoner had been a poor, hard-work- 
ing, and law-abiding resident who had migrated 
to this country from Texas several years before, 
bringing with him his wife and one child. He 
had brought about $1,000 American money, 
which had been sunk in a small farm near 
Tuxpam where he had cast his lot, hoping to 
make a fortune. One night his home was in- 
vaded by a couple of drunken natives who were 
determined to murder the whole family on 
account of some imaginary grievance. In de- 
fending his family and himself he killed one 
of them, and wounded the other, and next day 
90 



was cast into prison, where he was kept for 
alrnost two years— until his escape— without an 
opportunity to have his case heard. Meanwhile 
both his wife and child died of smallpox without 
being permitted to see him, and were buried 
without his knowledge. It was reported that 
after his incarceration his wife and child had 
moved into a hovel in town, and that when 
the coffin containing his child's body was borne 
past the jail on the shoulders of a native, en 
route to its last resting-place, by a most singular 
and unhappy coincidence he happened to be 
peering out through a small hole in the stone 
wall, and saw the procession. He is said to 
have remarked to another prisoner that some 
poor little one had been freed from the sorrows 
of life. 

How any white man can survive two years' 
imprisonment in a Mexican jail is beyond human 
comprehension; in fact we were informed that 
it is not intended that one should. I heard it 
remarked that "if a prisoner has plenty of 
money it is worth while hearing his case, but if 
he is poor, what profit is there in trying him?" 
The judges and lawyers are not likely to go 
probing around the jails merely for the sake 
of satisfying their craving for the proper dispen- 
sation of justice. We were told by one of the 
oldest resident Americans that if in the defense 
of one's own life it becomes necessary here to 
take the life of another, the safest thing to do 
91 



is to collect such arms, ammunition and money 
as may be immediately at hand and make 
straight through the country for the nearest 
boundary line, never submitting to detention 
until the ammunition is exhausted and life is 
entirely extinct. The filthiness and misery 
within the walls of a Mexican jail exceed the 
powers of human tongue to describe, and tardy 
justice in seeking a man out in one of these 
Plutonic holes is generally scheduled to arrive a 
day too late. 

With the exception of wood-ticks, the crop 
that thrives best of all in this part of Mexico, 
all the year round, is grass. There are two 
notable varieties; one is known as the South 
American Paral grass, and the other as Guinea 
grass. Both are exceedingly hardy and grow to 
great height. The Paral grass does not make 
seed in Mexico, but is generated from the green 
plant by taking small wisps of a dozen or more 
pieces, doubling them two or three times, after 
which they are pressed into holes made in the 
ground with a sharp stick, much after the man- 
ner of planting corn, and in rows about the same 
distance apart. Three or four inches of the 
wisp is allowed to protrude above the ground. 
It is generally planted thus in the latter part of 
May, — though at this season the ground is very 
dry, — because when the rains begin everybody 
is so busy planting and caring for the corn-crop 
that everything else is dropped. As soon as 
92 



seasonable weather begins the grass sprouts 
and sends out shoots along the ground in 
every direction, much like a strawberry-vine. 
From each joint the roots extend into the 
ground, and a shoot springs up. By the early 
fall the ground is completely covered, and by the 
first of January it is ready to pasture lightly. 
The growth is so thick and rapid that it smothers 
the weeds and even many of the sprouts that 
spring up from the stubs and stumps. I saw a 
small patch of this grass that had been planted 
early in April when the ground was so dry that 
it was impossible to make openings more than 
two or three inches deep with the sharp-pointed 
sticks, as the holes would fill up with the dry 
loose earth. This patch was planted by a native 
who wished to test the hardiness of the grass, 
and with little expectation that it would survive 
the scorching sun of April, May and a part pt 
June, until rain came. It was in May that I ex- 
amined this patch, and pulling up several wisps 
I did not find a single spear that had sprouted 
or appeared to have a particle of life or moisture 
in it. But when the rainy season commenced 
every hill of it sprouted and grew luxuriantly. 
During the rainy season in the fall it will readily 
take root when chopped into short pieces and 
scattered broadcast on the ground. 

The Guinea grass is almost as hardy as the 
Paral, but is planted only from the seed. It 
grows in great clusters, often to a height of six 
93 



feet, and soon covers the ground. These two 
grasses seem to draw a great deal of moisture 
from the air, and stand the dry season almost 
as well as the brush and trees. The cattle 
fatten very quickly on them and never require 
any grain. Beef-cattle are always in good de- 
mand at high prices, and there is no other 
industry so profitable here as cattle-raising. 

The deadly tarantula is as common here as 
crickets are in the United States, but to my 
astonishment the natives have no fear of them, 
and I never heard of anyone being bitten by one 
of these, perhaps the most venomous of all 
insects. They abound in the pastures and live 
in holes which they dig, two to four inches in 
the ground. One can always tell when the 
tarantula is at home, for the hole is then cov- 
ered with a web, while if he is out there is no 
web over the hole. I have dug them out by 
hundreds, and one forenoon I dug out and killed 
seventy-two, often finding two huge monsters 
together. They sometimes bite the cattle when 
feeding, and the bite is usually fatal. Their 
deadly enemy is the wasp (Pompilus formosus) 
by which they are attacked and stung to death 
if they venture out into the open roadway or 
other bare ground. 

The most deadly reptile is the four-nosed 

snake; it usually measures from four to six feet 

in length and from 2^ to four inches in diameter 

at the largest part, with sixteen great fangs, 

94 



eight above and eight below. They have the 
ferocity of a bulldog and the venom of the 
Egyptian asp. The natives fear them next to 
the evil spirit. The most remarkable feat of 
human courage that I ever witnessed was a 
battle between an Indian workman and one of 
these snakes. In company with a number of 
other workmen the Indian was chopping brush 
on my place around a clearing that was being 
burned, and the snake sprang at him from a 
clump of bushes as he approached it. The 
Indian struck at the snake with his machete, at 
the same time jumping aside. The snake, nar- 
rowly missing his mark, landed four or five feet 
beyond. Immediately forming in a coil he 
lunged back at the Indian, catching his bare leg 
just below the knee, and fastening his fangs 
into the flesh like a dog. The Indian made a 
quick pass with his machete and severed the 
snake's body about four inches from the head, 
leaving the head still clinging to his leg. He 
stuck the point of the machete down through 
the snake's mouth, and twisting it around pried 
the jaws apart, when the head dropped to the 
ground. Four of the workmen and myself stood 
within fifty feet of the scene, all petrified with 
amazement. The Indian realizing that his doom 
was sealed stood for a moment in silent contem- 
plation, then walked directly to where the fire 
was burning and picking up a burning stick he 
applied the red-hot embers on the end to the 
95 



affected part, holding it tightly against his leg 
and turning it over and over until the flesh was 
seared to the bone. After completing the op- 
eration he fell in a dead faint. He was carried 
to the house and revived. His grit and courage 
saved his life, and in less than three weeks he 
was at work again. I offered a bounty of one 
dollar apiece for every snake of this variety 
killed on my ranch, and the natives would form 
hunting-parties and look for them on Sundays 
and rainy days. They were brought in in such 
numbers that I began to think the whole place 
was infested with them, when presently I dis- 
covered that they were killing and bringing 
them from all the surrounding country. They 
were so cunning that they would bring a snake 
and hide it somewhere on the place, then com- 
ing to the house they would announce that they 
were going snake-hunting, and in fifteen or 
twenty minutes would march in triumphantly 
dragging the snake, usually by a string of green 
bark. 

There is in Mexico a small tree called palo de 
leehe (milk tree) which produces a milk so 
poisonous that the evaporation will sometimes 
poison a person at a distance of several feet. The 
smallest infinitesimal part coming in contact 
with the mucous membrane of the eye will pro- 
duce almost instant blindness, accompanied by 
the most excruciating pain. The only antidote 
known to the natives is to grind up peppers of 
96 



the most powerful strength— as strong as those 
of which tabasco sauce is made— and pour the 
liquid into the affected eye. I saw this dis- 
tressing operation performed twice while in 
Mexico. The natives naturally dread to en- 
counter these trees when clearing. 

There is an abundance of scorpions in Mexico. 
They are to be found under rocks and logs, and 
particularly throughout the house. One morn- 
ing I found four snugly housed in one of my 
shoes. After putting my foot into the shoe the 
instinctive promptness with which I removed it 
from my foot reminded me of the army-ant 
episode when the boatmen so hastily removed 
their shirts. In putting on my shoes after that 
I learned to " shake well before using." 

Among the nuisances in Mexico the fleas take 
their place in the first rank. They appear to 
thrive in every locality and under all conditions. 
Like vicious bulldogs, they are especially fond 
of strangers, and never lose an opportunity of 
showing their domestic hospitality. In connec- 
tion with the flea family there is a very small 
black variety, the name of which in Spanish is 
pronounced newaw. They usually attack the 
feet, especially of the natives— for they wear 
no shoes— and burrow in under the skin around 
the toenails or at the bottom of the foot, and 
remaining there they deposit a great number of 
eggs which are surrounded by a thin tissue 
similar to that which covers a ball of spider 

97 



eggs. The presence of this troublesome insect 
is not noticeable until the eggs begin to enlarge, 
when there is an irritating itching sensation 
followed by pain and swelling. The skin has to 
be punctured and the sack of eggs removed,— 
not a pleasant operation, especially when there 
are forty or fifty at one time. These insects 
thrive at all seasons, and, next to the omni- 
present wood-tick, are one of the worst torments 
extant. I have frequently seen natives whose 
feet were so swollen and sore that they could 
scarcely walk. At recurrent seasons there is a 
fly that deposits a diminutive egg underneath 
the skin of human beings by means of a needle- 
like organ, and the larva of which produces an 
extremely disagreeable sensation, sometimes 
followed by fever. 

This does not by any means exhaust the list 
of disagreeable insects and reptiles, but enough 
are mentioned to give the reader some idea 
of the bodily torments to which both the in- 
habitants and the visitor are constantly sub- 
jected. 

Having obtained a fair idea of the existing 
conditi<^ns we may now return to our friend 
Mr. B., and then wend our journey homeward. 
After the visit to the hacienda of the wealthy 
Spanish gentleman (who, by the way, brought 
most of his wealth from Spain), he was perhaps 
the least concerned of any man in Mexico as to 
whether vanilla, rubber, coffee or anything else 
98 



could be profitably grown there. Like Dickens 
with his Dora, he could see nothing but "Car- 
mencita" everywhere, and no matter upon what 
line or topic the conversation turned it was sure 
to end in the thought of some new charm in 
the black-eyed beauty. She was not only a 
flower, but a whole garden of flowers, too beau- 
tiful and too delicate to subsist long in that 
vulgar soil. She longed for the life, excitement 
and companionship of the friends of her school- 
days in America, compared with which the hum- 
drum monotony of a Mexican hacienda seemed 
like exile. With ample means and social stand- 
ing as an armor the conquest was therefore a 
predestined conclusion. The conquering knight 
returned home with me, but in less than seven 
weeks he was back again, though not by the way 
of the loitering route down the laguna. In the 
following November he returned again to Amer- 
ica, bringing with him the coveted treasure 
whom he installed in a beautiful home in 
America's greatest metropolis. The union of 
these two kindred souls was a happy event. 
Their home has since been blessed with the 
advent of two lovely girls and one boy. It is 
therefore no longer true that no American 
fortune-hunter has ever returned from the 
rural districts of southeastern Mexico richer 
than when he went there; for here is an instance 
where one of the most priceless of all gems was 
captured and borne triumphantly away from a 
99 



land which appears to abound in nothing but 
pestilence and torment. 

Verily may it be said that this part of Mexico 
whose people, possibilities, peculiarities, pesti- 
lences and pests I have briefly sketched in the 
foregoing pages, was made for Mexicans, and so 
far as I am personally concerned, they are ever- 
lastingly welcome to it. 



100 



19J0 



One copy del. to Cat. Div. 



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